The Fashion Disaster
by tpt player 5701
Summary: A "Mind Games"-verse story: "I've been tuning my BS detector," Rena Rouge explained. "I got sick of falling for people's pathetic lies – so embarrassing – so I developed a new superpower. Of course, the old one's pretty good, too. And if you don't cooperate, I might have to use it on you"… "This one give you anything?" Anansi asked. "Not much," she answered. "But more than we had."
1. Chapter 1

_AN: This story is a sequel to "A Jagged Ride with the Owl," with a lot of direct connections to "Tit for Tat" and "Along Came Anansi." "An Adrienette Anthology" chapter 7 also provides some background information for this story. The connections are strong with this one!_

_To Dragon Lord Draco: This is pretty much what you suggested in your review on "Along Came Anansi," but I'd actually written this a while ago! Alya's definitely not going to be happy if Anansi is going out alone, but she's also going to respect her (much) older sister. Remember, they aren't typically dealing with the same caliber of villains now that they were back when Hawk Moth was around. The vast majority are common thugs._

* * *

Rena Rouge crouched atop an apartment building, taking in the scene from the street below in the glow of the streetlights. A drug dealer and his handful of runners and muscle had been camped out on a street corner all day, until a figure in a muted yellow full-body suit had appeared just before sundown.

The vigilante – Anansi – had begun by grabbing the largest of the drug dealer's two muscle guys around the neck, cutting off his windpipe and dragging him into the small walkway between two apartment buildings. Rena Rouge's enhanced hearing had only picked up a single muffled grunt following his disappearance. Anansi next appeared on the other side of the building and grabbed one of the dealer's runners in the same manner. Unfortunately, when she had gone to grab a third, her luck had run out. A customer had pulled up at just that moment, pointed to where she was creeping up behind the dealer's other muscle guy, and screamed. They had all turned to follow the customer's finger, and Anansi had barreled into the crowd with fists and feet flying.

Rena Rouge snorted as the last couple criminals tried to catch Anansi between them. Anansi simply sidestepped so the one standing in front missed her head and caught the other thug in the jaw. That man went down like a marionette with its strings cut, leaving Anansi with a single assailant: the drug dealer himself. Rena Rouge stood up, turned her head in either direction to work the kinks out of her neck, rolled her shoulders, and leapt from her perch. As she sailed across the street, she watched Anansi knock the dealer to the ground so hard the back of his head slammed into the sidewalk. She feared she had mistimed the jump, but breathed a sigh of relief as the dealer lifted his head and blinked against the bright lights above him.

"You know they need to be _conscious_ if they're going to answer our questions, right?" Rena Rouge landed a meter in front of where Anansi loomed over the dealer and allowed her momentum to carry her through a forward roll. She sprang to her feet right in front of Anansi and held out her flute to block Anansi's kick to the dealer's head.

"I don't remember inviting you to this party, Foxy," Anansi retorted. She sent Rena Rouge an angry glare, though the anger didn't quite reach her eyes. "I told you last time, I work alone."

"Says the battle-hardened vigilante who teamed up with the Owl and 'Guitar Hero' a couple weeks ago," Rena Rouge shot back at her, suppressing a snort. "The Owl was practically _swooning_ after your little team-up, you know. He wanted matching outfits and a dedicated patrol night with his two favorite _teammates_!"

Anansi shook her head. "Are you serious? I _told_ the Professor it was a one-time deal…"

"And anyways," Rena Rouge continued, "I thought the point of this was to get _information_. How are you planning on getting that information if you give him a concussion?"

"I was _going_ to ask him questions between beatings," Anansi muttered. Rena Rouge snorted. "But if you think _you_ can do a better job of getting information from this weasel, be my guest. Just remember, when you fail, I'll be happy to step in and… _squeeze_ it out of him…" Anansi cracked her knuckles for emphasis.

Rena Rouge winked at Anansi, who quirked her lip into a half-smile while the dealer was looking down the street for help. As Anansi slid back into the space between the buildings to check on her other unconscious prisoners, Rena Rouge knelt next to the drug dealer, whose eyes still looked dazed and unfocused. She slapped him, hard, across the face to get his attention. "Still with me, dirtbag?"

The dealer looked up in surprise which quickly turned to confusion. "Wha–?"

"He's alive," Rena Rouge commented, smirking. "I suppose I should congratulate you: you lasted marginally longer against Anansi than the _last_ drug dealer she took down. Of course, that's not saying too much; that coward wet himself the moment he saw her and started begging for his mother! Still," she continued, stroking her chin thoughtfully, "it's no mean feat to stand up to Anansi like that. I'm inclined to be nice and _not_ let her finish the job by knocking you out. She won't be happy about that, but…"

The dealer furrowed his brow deeper in confusion as she talked, though she could see the seeds of doubt and fear in his eyes. She gave him an evaluating look and grinned at him, channeling as much of Chloe's condescension and arrogance as she could. The terror in his eyes that he couldn't mask showed that the look had worked as intended.

"No, I don't think I'll let her at you again… _yet_," she told him, "but that only holds as long as you tell me everything you know. Let's start with a name. I can't just call you 'hey dirtbag,' can I?"

The dealer was silent for a moment, but at a look from Rena Rouge he wilted. "Pierre."

"See, that wasn't so hard, Pierre," Rena Rouge said conversationally. "Now let's try another question: where do the drugs come from?"

"Colombia," he retorted.

Rena Rouge nodded to him as though defeated. "I suppose that's technically correct," she admitted. "To be honest, I'm not overly concerned with how the drugs get into the country." Seeing his look she added, "Don't get me wrong: I'm sure the police will have plenty of questions for you about the drug trade – if Anansi doesn't break in your teeth so you can't _answer_ their questions, that is. No, I'm more interested in your organization. How did a nice guy like you wind up in a job like this?"

"Internship." He gritted his teeth, though Rena Rouge could see his confidence slipping.

"Your mother must be so proud. So who was it that recruited you for this… 'internship'?"

"Just – just some guy," he tried.

"Thing is, _Pierre_," Rena Rouge informed him, "I can tell you're lying. I'm guessing the person who recruited you is a little more important to you than 'some guy.' I'm guessing you're still close with them. My guess? You still work for them." Seeing the look on his face she quickly corrected herself. "No… you _used_ to work for him, but now you don't. And you're not happy about that, are you?"

"How the _hell_ could you possibly know all of that?" Pierre demanded. His eyes grew wide and Rena Rouge could hear the hitch in his breathing.

"I've been tuning my BS detector," she explained. "I got sick of listening to and falling for people's pathetic lies – _so_ embarrassing – so I decided to develop a new superpower. Of course," she added, "the old one's pretty good, too. And if you don't cooperate, I might have to use it on you…"

She leaned back to consider. Watching his face, she saw more of his confidence leaking out. His posture, which had gotten more confident, had weakened as his shoulders sagged further and further.

"Let's talk about who your boss is," she finally said. "This guy who kicked out your old boss: he have a name?"

"I-I can't…"

"Sure, you can," she assured him, "because you don't have a choice. I'm going to get these answers from you; it's only a question of how much effort it will take for me to get them. And whether you'll need new underwear or not afterward. So who is he?"

Pierre slumped in defeat. "His name is Levebvre. He killed our old boss and took over a month or so back. Now _he_'s calling the shots."

"Is he the one who gave you the lynchpin?"

"What?"

"You have a lynchpin in your pocket," she repeated. "I see the outline. Is this Levebvre guy the one who gave it to you?"

He clamped his mouth shut and refused to speak.

Rena Rouge shook her head in disappointment. "Tsk, tsk, tsk. I didn't want to do this, but you're not leaving me much choice." She laughed at the look he gave her, his eyes straying toward the alley down which Anansi had disappeared. "No, I'm not giving you to her, though by the time I'm finished you may wish I had.

"No, I think I will test out my ability on you." She stood up and paced around him where he lay on the floor. "I'm sure you know about Cat Noir – Cataclysm is his thing: unlimited destruction. Queen Bee can hit you and immobilize you, then there's nothing you can do until it wears off. Taureau Dechaine could break you in half with his bare hands and throw you from her to the Atlantic, and that's without even _using_ his special ability. Viperion, now he could slap you, over and over again for hours on end, and you wouldn't remember a thing. Me? I can't do any of that. But what I _can_ do is make anything I want come to life. So tell me, tough guy, what are you most afraid of?"

He looked at her with sheer panic in his eyes. Nonetheless, he didn't say a word.

"Some people are afraid of snakes," she told him, watching his face for a reaction. "Others, it's spiders. Some people are absolutely terrified of heights. But not you. You're not afraid of anything of those things, are you? No, I think you're afraid of something much more mundane… So tell me, are you afraid… of the dark?"

The look Pierre gave her was enough of a confirmation for Rena Rouge to lift the flute to her lips and blow a quiet note in his face. A thick black bubble congealed out of the flute end and covered his head. He immediately went rigid before his limbs started quivering in fear.

"Breathe," she instructed him. "It's not _solid_; you're not going to suffocate." She sat down near his head. "It's amazing: I can turn anything into reality. If you were afraid of being eaten by a dinosaur, I could make that happen! The light thing is so much simpler – thanks for that, B-T-dubs. But _you_ can bring back the light very simply: just tell me everything you know about the Lynchpin."

"Please–" he whimpered. "I-I don't know anything! Levebvre gave us all lynchpins after he took over. He said it was like a secret club thing or something. Messed up, huh? I _really_ don't know why! He-he said his boss has a thing for them."

Rena Rouge nodded in understanding. _This "Levebvre" may not be the Lynchpin himself, but we're probably getting close to the top._ "Pierre," she said quietly. "I'm disappointed. I already knew all of that. I was hoping you would give me a little more. If you won't say anything for me, say it for the light… you want the light to come back, don't you?"

"I-I swear I don't know anything else!"

"Mr. Sun isn't going to be happy with you…" Rena Rouge started whistling "Here Comes the Sun" mournfully.

"No! Wait! He-he said something yesterday! We're supposed to be looking for a junkie hacker. Goes by the name of 'Spider' 'cuz he's got his feelers all over the Web. Even has a spider web tattoo on his face to emphasize the name. If he shows up at any of our corners, we're supposed to send him back to the boss. But that's _it_! That's all I got for you!" Pierre started thrashing around inside the bubble.

Rena Rouge calmly knelt down and popped the Mirage bubble with her finger. Pierre blinked owlishly against the sudden brightness of the streetlights. "See? That wasn't so hard. Thank you for your cooperation." She waved toward the alley, and Anansi appeared. "Now Anansi will bring you down to the police station. I believe you have a hot date with a detective who's going to be _very_ interested in some of the information you didn't want to give me! Just remember… Mr. Sun is counting on your honesty…"

Pierre blanched and gulped as Rena Rouge pulled him to his feet.

"This one give you anything?" Anansi muttered in her ear.

"Not much," Rena Rouge told her. "But it's more than what we had."


	2. Chapter 2

_AN: To avoid any confusion, this does not reference the same photo shoot from "An Adrienette Anthology" chapter 7; that one was in the fall; this story takes place around the end of February._

_To anonymousfriend27: This is a very Alya-centric story, and let's just say that you haven't seen _anything_ yet… Also, Anansi's probably going to take that secret to her grave!_

* * *

"Can't you do _anything_ right?"

"I'm s-s-sorry."

Marinette looked up from the sketchpad laid out on her desk to see M. Janet, Agreste's office manager, glaring down at the university intern at the desk across from hers. The intern in question, Marie, looked close to tears, her eyes wide and lower lip quivering, a pair of shears quivering in her loose grip. Janet, for his part, was leaning over the desk, his chest centimeters from Marie's shoulders and his face level with her own. His clenched fist rested right next to her sewing machine, across which a skirt was draped. Marie trembled with terror as she looked away from Janet, down at the floor underneath her desk.

"What's wrong?" Marinette asked, setting the sketchpad aside.

"I-I cut the hem on this skirt unevenly," Marie squeaked out, with a tiny head bob toward Janet. She looked up at him and immediately shrank back. "I-I-I'm sorry. I was nervous."

"Can I take a look?" Marinette asked, reaching across and grabbing the skirt in question without waiting for an answer. She recognized it as one she had designed for the spring line and which they needed for a photo shoot the next day. The model who was supposed to wear it had gotten sick. Juleka, their replacement model, was a centimeter shorter so they needed to re-hem the skirt to make sure it fit properly. Marinette eyed the unsewn bottom edge critically as she reached for her shears, trying to ignore the increasing volume of the conversation across the desk from her.

"What are they teaching you at this university? Do you need to go back to primary school and relearn how to use scissors?" Janet slapped the desk for emphasis.

"I-I–"

Marinette found the problem spot and set to work straightening the edge, removing a tiny strip of fabric.

Janet threw his hands in the air, encompassing the whole room in his anger. "I tell you, it is an embarrassment to this fashion house to have such incompetent people working here! If you can't repair the mistake _you_ just made, it is coming out of your paycheck!"

"But–"

Marinette flipped the switch on her sewing machine and loaded it with the proper periwinkle thread. As the motor whirred to life, she concentrated on keeping both the hem and the line of stitches even. However, even over the sound of the sewing machine she could still hear Janet's tirade.

"Imagine it: an entire photo shoot– all that money, all those man-hours – wasted because of _your_ mistake! Why, if _I_ were in charge of this design team–"

"But you're not," Marinette muttered, a little louder than she'd intended to, turning off the sewing machine a moment before she spoke. The silence left in its wake was deafening.

"I'm sorry?" Janet turned his glare on her. "I'm not _what_?"

Marinette met his gaze steadily. "You're _not_ in charge of the design team," she told him, pointing across the room to where Mme Legrand had just walked through the doorway. "She is."

"I'm the manager of this fashion house!" he declared, bringing himself up to his full height. "I'm in charge of everything that happens at this company! And I will _not_ stand for incompetence on my watch!"

"You're the _office_ manager," Marinette retorted, raising her voice angrily. "You run the office while Adrien is unavailable. You make phone calls and negotiate contracts for him to review and maintain records. That doesn't put you in charge of the company! Your name isn't on the side of the building! And as for incompetence, Marie is _not_ the incompetent one here. _Her_ work is perfect whenever _you_ aren't in the room!"

"I will not stand for such insubordination from a lowly lycée intern!" Janet shouted, slamming his fist on Marie's desk. Marie yelped and jumped back, barely catching herself before she fell out of her chair. Marinette burst to her feet, sending her own chair clattering across the floor, placed both her hands on the desk in front of her, and glared across the desks at him. "I should fire you right now, Mlle Dupain-Cheng!"

"Actually, you can't," Mme Legrand interjected, stopping to one side of the desks, between Janet and Marinette. She folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her eyes at Janet.

"I – what?" bellowed Janet, turning his anger against Mme Legrand. His face had by now turned a dark shade of purple.

"You don't have the authority to fire members of my design team, _or_ to terminate Marinette's internship," she explained calmly.

"And you do?"

"Me? Certainly not!" Mme Legrand replied placidly. "The only one who can end Marinette's internship is M. Agreste."

"M. Agreste?" Janet repeated blankly. He rolled his eyes. "Why on earth he would reserve that power to himself is beyond me. But in that case, that is exactly where we are going right now. You–" he pointed at Marinette "–are coming with me."

Janet grabbed Marinette tightly by the upper arm and dragged her out of the design team room, with Mme Legrand trailing after them. Marinette caught a flash of red near the purse she had left sitting on the floor beside her desk; doubtless Tikki was on her way through the floor to Adrien's office. Marinette had to hurry to keep up with Janet's pace. She knew she shouldn't have risen to his bait. But she couldn't stand listening to the way he treated the other designers, and especially the interns. It reminded her uncomfortably of how Chloe had treated everyone years earlier, before she'd received her miraculous and become a full member of the team. Like they were subhuman. Like he was better than them. Janet led them down the hallway, past his own office, through the reception area where Mme Batteaux, the executive secretary, stared at them slack-jawed from behind her desk, to the door at the far end labeled "M. Agreste, Owner." He knocked on the door and, without waiting for a response, barged straight in.

Adrien looked up from the paperwork on his desk in surprise as Janet walked in, with Marinette in tow and Mme Legrand following behind. Marinette briefly caught his eye and saw a flicker of concern there. His nostrils flared the tiniest bit as his eyes trailed down to her arm, caught sight of Janet's hand, and returned to her own eyes. She gave him a subtle reassuring smile, and he relaxed the tiniest bit, leaning back in his chair.

"M. Janet," Adrien said without rising from the desk, "to what do I owe this… unexpected… visit?"

"The design team at this fashion house is in disarray, and I have conclusively determined that the problem is none other than this intern!" Janet answered, dragging Marinette forward by the arm to stand in front of him and shifting his hand to squeeze her shoulder painfully. "She is rude and disrespectful. She is insubordinate and talks back to me! You must get rid of her if our design team is to function properly."

Adrien's eyes narrowed, but Marinette saw the hint of a smirk ghost across Adrien's face as he leaned forward, placed his elbows on the desk, and steepled his hands in front of his chin. He looked at both of them impassively for a moment before responding. "This is a very serious accusation you make, Monsieur. And what does the intern in question have to say for herself?"

"You would take an _intern_'s word over _mine_?"

"I will listen to everyone," Adrien answered evenly, turning to Marinette. "Mlle Dupain-Cheng?"

Marinette wanted to take it all back, but knew she couldn't. Not now. She'd gone too far for Janet to just forget about it. _In for a sou, in for a livre_. "M. Janet has been badgering the design team all afternoon," she began. "He was invading Marie's personal space and made her so nervous she made a mistake. A mistake that I corrected in less time than he spent berating her for making it! He scares the designers. He's a sexual harassment lawsuit waiting to happen! He constantly criticizes. He is condescending to _everyone_, and especially the interns. Everything functions perfectly well when he is elsewhere, but it falls to pieces as soon as he shows up. Everyone gets nervous when he's even in the _room_! If there is a problem here, it is him!"

Adrien's expression remained neutral as he continued to look between Marinette and Janet. Then he met Marinette's eye and twitched his eyebrow in a question. She shrugged the shoulder Janet wasn't holding as subtly as she could. Finally, Adrien lowered his hands and said, "You both have serious allegations here. I don't think I can make any decision on this without my _partner_ at my side."

"I'm sorry?" Janet asked nonplussed. Marinette heard a sudden hint of doubt in his voice. His grip on her shoulder tightened reflexively. "But… you don't have a partner."

"Oh, you're quite right that I do not have an _official_ partner in this business," Adrien replied, smiling a little too calmly. "But I do have a partner whose presence is absolutely crucial to the long-term success of this fashion house."

Adrien reached under his desk and pulled out a folding chair. He stood up, rolling his own chair a meter to the side as he did so, and set up the folding chair next to the other chair. Marinette carefully reached up and peeled Janet's now-slack hand off her shoulder, one finger at a time, before walking around the desk. She rolled the shoulder he had grabbed to work out the soreness from his grip. Adrien pulled out his office chair, gestured for Marinette to sit, and pushed her chair in before taking the folding chair for himself.

Marinette relaxed into the chair, looked across Adrien's desk, and took a moment to savor the look of shock, confusion, and horror plastered on Janet's face. His eyes bulged from their sockets and his mouth worked uselessly to form words. His face had lost all its previous color. His arms hung limply by his sides. Behind him and slightly to the side, Mme Legrand stood with her arms crossed and struggled to contain the mirthful smile that threatened to break out across her face as her gaze flitted between Janet and Marinette. Marinette forced her face to show nothing but calm, avoiding even the hint of a smile at Janet's discomfort and Legrand's amusement.

Adrien fixed Janet with a deathly serious look. Marinette could feel the tension radiating from him in waves. The hands he rested on the desk were both clenched into tight, white-knuckled fists, and she caught him running his thumb over his miraculous. All his earlier calm had vanished in an instant. If he were transformed, she had no doubt he would Cataclysm Janet without hesitation. She slid her hand over to rest on his knee under the desk and gave it a reassuring squeeze. Adrien curled his lip in a tiny smile for her and released some of the tension in his hands before focusing all his attention back on Janet. He narrowed his eyes as he said, "Now, what were you saying about my partner?"

* * *

Marinette wrapped her arms around Adrien tightly as he escorted her out of the building. A few employees looked at them in surprise, but she ignored all of them. Now that the adrenaline of the confrontation was leaking out, all Marinette wanted was to go home and put the stress and anxiety of the last hour behind her. Adrien gently squeezed her shoulder as they got into the car and the Gorilla pulled away from the curb.

"Hey, are you okay, Princess?" he asked, looking at her in concern.

Marinette sighed and rested her head on his shoulder. "I will be," she told him. "After… that… I feel like I just want to sleep for a week."

"Yeah…" Adrien rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "I'm sorry I let it go on for so long."

"I forgive you," she yawned. "So, do you believe me about him _now_?"

"I always believed you, Princess," he assured her. "I just didn't know what I could do about him. I mean, we do kind of still need a manager for during the day when I'm not there."

"For now, why not let Mme Legrand and Mme Batteaux handle things during the day?" Marinette suggested, closing her eyes and snuggling into his shoulder. "You can find a new manager in a week or two. Hopefully you'll have better candidates to pick from this time around."

"You're right," he agreed softly, hugging her gently. "As usual."

"Are you still planning a video game night with Nino?" she asked when the car pulled up in front of the bakery.

"That was the plan," he answered, picking her up bridal style and carrying her inside the bakery and up the stairs to the apartment. "But if you want me to stay with you after that… mess…"

"No," she told him as he set her down on the living room couch. "Go and have fun with Nino. I'm probably just going to eat and then fall asleep right here."

* * *

_A "sou" is a pre-Euro French coin roughly equivalent to an American nickel. A "livre" is an old French coin that was later replaced by the franc. If there's a better French equivalent to "In for a penny, in for a pound," please let me know and I will correct it!_


	3. Chapter 3

_AN: I was curious about the French educational system the other day when I realized the characters couldn't stay 16 all year… Turns out (more continuity problems, considering that "Origins" makes it sound like they're in their _first_ year of collège rather than their last) that they should be in lycée now (remember, my stories take place in the third year after the show began). I had been pretty vague up to now on their school level, but I did __make a couple corrections so they are in lycée__. And their friends are all in the lycée. So nothing's really changed from the original version with this small retcon. Would you have noticed if I didn't say anything?_

_To anonymousfriend27: I think you'll be saying that a little more often by the end of this story…_

_To Rose Tiger: Oh, we're not done with him yet!_

_To Speckleflower: Hopefully seeing things from his perspective will explain things. A little._

* * *

M. Janet considered himself to be a reasonable man. He was dedicated to his career and his profession. When he took on a task he would get it done right. The consummate professional in his chosen field. He took pride in his ability to manage any business handed to him, to "right the ship" for a foundering company. It was a feat he had accomplished several times before on his climb up the ladder – for a coffee shop, a restaurant, and a pair of poorly-run department stores before now.

So when he had been offered the job of Office Manager at Agreste Fashion, he had leapt at the opportunity. Paris' most ubiquitous fashion house: on the brink of disaster after the arrest of its founder. The company's name – especially its acclaimed and widely-sought "Gabriel" brand – had been synonymous with _haute couture_ for nearly two decades. And with the unmasking of Hawk Moth, both his names – "Gabriel" and "Agreste Fashion" – had become bywords throughout Paris, practically overnight. Watching the drama unfold in the newspaper alongside the rest of the population of Paris, Janet had been moderately impressed with the younger Agreste's tenacity in attempting to salvage the family business. Using the majority of his trust fund to form a charity to help his father's victims? His philanthropy had bought him some breathing room from the press and almost put him back in their good graces. Placing their flagship "Gabriel" brand on an indefinite hiatus and creating the new "Heroes of Paris" line, with all the profits donated to the same charity? That had played surprisingly well with the customers – many of whom, he was sure, had been Akumatized or affected by Akuma attacks and now despised the idea of wearing clothing named for their (then-unknown) tormentor. Simply keeping the company's doors open and the lights on? At his age and with everything that had happened, that must have taken great courage on the boy's part – or great foolishness.

The fact of the matter, so far as Janet was concerned, was that the model was in over his head in the world of business.

When young M. Agreste had contacted him through a recruitment company and offered him the Office Manager position, Janet had been excited, to say the least. He had known he could turn the company around, rescue it from a slow death at the hands of an unforgiving public, and restore it to prominence. All he needed was freedom to manage in his own way, to push the employees to perform to the absolute best of their ability.

Instead, the stupid model and his stupid "partner" had used his managerial skills to rebuild the company and repair its reputation, only to immediately humiliate him and cast him aside.

He turned to glare at the woman responsible for escorting him out of the building. "I don't see why _you_'re enjoying this so much," he grumbled.

Mme Legrand raised her eyebrows at him. "You didn't exactly make it easy for anyone to sympathize with you here, Monsieur," she told him icily. "Can you look me in the eye and honestly say that any of Marinette's accusations were unfounded? Do you deny any of what she said?"

"'Do I deny it…' Of course I deny it!" he insisted, eyes narrowing in anger. "Everything I did here was for the good of this company!"

"Intimidating interns was good for the company?"

He sputtered. "I never–"

"Marie has been acting skittish for the last month!" Legrand seethed, not a trace of her usual good humor present in her expression. "Now that I know _why_, I only wish I had been present sooner to see the way you were treating her! You're only lucky you never pulled the same crap with _me_ around that you did in my design team room today. She could easily have sued you for harassment – and I would have supported it!"

Janet scoffed. "That girl is never going to amount to much."

"Which girl? Marie, or are you talking about Marinette now?" Legrand asked pointedly. "Because Marie shows promise, with the proper training and experience. Perhaps she will not become the next Audrey Bourgeois, but she will certainly find a place in the fashion industry – and if I have anything to say about it, she will find that place here."

Janet threw his office door open, grabbed a copy paper box off the floor, and swept everything on his desk into the box with a single motion before starting on the desk's contents. "I _was_ talking about Marie, and we'll have to agree to disagree on her future prospects in this industry," he told her. "But since you brought her up, do let's talk about Mlle Dupain-Cheng."

"What about Marinette?" Legrand leaned against the doorframe, watching him closely.

"Did you know that this lycée intern was M. Agreste's 'partner'?"

Legrand snorted. He looked up from the desk drawer he was dumping out into his box to see her nearly doubled over in silent laughter. "Of course I knew," she finally told him when she had stopped laughing and wiped the tears from her eyes. "Why do you think I've been giving a lycée intern so much of my time, so much responsibility, and so much legitimate design work? Why do you think a full _third_ of our current offerings – including almost half the upcoming spring line – was designed by an intern? You really don't understand the _fashion_ industry, do you?" she asked rhetorically. "Sixteen-year-olds aren't normally designing pieces for major fashion shows, you know. And a _university_ intern – to say nothing of a _lycée _intern – at a photo shoot? They are normally fetching coffee and tea or at best assisting in outfit changes, not making major last-minute alterations to important pieces on the fly!"

"You knew!?" he demanded, outraged. He stood upright and glared at her over the desk.

"Obviously," Legrand answered serenely, arms folded across her chest. "They weren't overtly affectionate here, but they haven't exactly been subtle about their friendship. They were even photographed together a couple times during the media blitz after his father's arrest. But yes, when Marinette started at the company Adrien approached me directly and asked me to take her on as a protégé. He wants her to learn the family business from the ground up."

"'Family business'…" He was at a momentary loss for words as the meaning behind that phrase sunk in. "This boy is making major business decisions with his–"

"–If you finish that sentence you will look an even bigger fool than you did ten minutes ago," she interrupted him, eyes flashing with anger. She looked at her watch. "She may be on the fast track at Agreste, but don't think for a minute that she doesn't earn her breaks. I may assign her so many design projects because Adrien believes her to be the future of the company, but I _accept_ so many of them because they are high-quality. Now if you have found all of your personal belongings, I think it's high time for you to find the door."

"Please don't tell me that you think this kid is making the right decision by putting his romantic feelings towards this girl ahead of the best interests of his company," Janet pleaded as he picked up his box and allowed her to escort him out of the building.

"If you had told me five years ago that today I would be training a nearly-seventeen-year-old to take over as the creative vision behind Agreste in a few years, I would have laughed in your face," Legrand confessed. "Of course, if five years ago you'd told me that my admittedly-slightly-misanthropic boss was going to become a super-villain, I _also_ would have laughed in your face. I guess that's the world we live in now. This company began 20 years ago with Mme Agreste's money funding M. Agreste's design talent and vision. And having watched these two for the past eight months, I feel quite confident in saying that Adrien _is_ making the right decision for his company's long-term future by putting his faith in Marinette. This girl is something special; I haven't seen this kind of talent since I first met Gabriel. So yes, I do think that if everything proceeds as it should, in a few years Agreste Fashion will be M. Agreste's money funding Mme Agreste's design talent and vision."

"I never pegged you for a hopeless romantic, Mme Legrand," Janet scoffed.

"I am simply looking at reality, M. Janet," she replied evenly, shutting the door after him.

* * *

Janet fumed all the way to the Metro station where he caught the train to his apartment on the other side of the city. He sat sullenly on a seat, his box of possessions on his lap, glaring daggers at any passenger unfortunate enough to come within three meters of him. He had given his best to Agreste Fashion for five months. The company's reputation was in shambles when he started, but its reputation had begun to recover under his management. After months of lowered sales, Agreste had actually earned a modest profit in the previous quarter. He did so much for the company, and the _boy_ and his stupid girlfriend had used and discarded him! It just was not fair!

He had hoped that returning Agreste to respectability would be his stepping stone to bigger and better opportunities – perhaps within the fashion industry, perhaps not – but now that would never be the case. Agreste would forever be a black mark on his previously-spotless résumé, one that he could never get rid of, even if he did manage to find a new position.

He scoffed, looking down at the small box. He had devoted so much of his life to his career that he had not left room for anything else. The only personal touches in his office had been those recommended by the best management coaches: a couple pictures of himself in front of the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben to help him make a personal connection with his employees. A book about cutting-edge management techniques he had been reading during his lunch breaks. A Newton's Cradle that was supposed to put people at ease in his office. His framed diploma proclaiming his qualification as a business manager. Nothing truly personal, but he wasn't sure what kind of person he could truly be without his work. He'd never had a significant relationship – no pictures of a wife or children to display on his desk to humanize him – because he'd been too dedicated to his career to ever make a relationship work. And now that career was gone, possibly forever. His reputation was going to be ruined, and it was all because of Adrien Agreste and Marinette Dupain-Cheng.

Janet threw the door to his lonely apartment open a little harder than he had intended. The door slammed into the wall and rebounded with a thud. He dropped the box containing his possessions on the dining room table and walked over to the bar to find a bottle of wine. On the way he passed the phone, and saw the blinking light indicating a voice message. His curiosity piqued – he didn't know anyone who would _want_ to call him at home – he played the message.

"Monsieur Janet," a robotic voice said, "I understand you were cheated out of your job. If you want to do something about that, come to the Louvre at midnight."


	4. Chapter 4

_To Rose Tiger: Well, the title is "The Fashion _Disaster_," so it can't be all sunshine and rainbows!_

_To anonymousfriend27: If he used Cataclysm on Janet, that would kind-of be murder! Personally, I think it's a little more frightening that these people choose to do bad things _without_ superpowers or compulsion…_

_To Speckleflower: That is the mystery…_

* * *

The next morning, Marinette arrived at school early for once. She was waiting on the front steps with an extra pastry and coffee when Adrien's car pulled up and he got out. He took one look at the school, smiled, and made a beeline straight for her. Marinette held the gifts out to him, but before accepting them he wrapped her up in a big hug. He picked her up and swung her around once, slowly so as not to spill the coffee, before setting her back on her feet. Then he took a bite out of the pastry, sighing in contentment and pleasure.

He pulled her into another hug with his free hand. "Good morning, Princess," he whispered into her hair.

She hummed. "I should get up early and bring you coffee more often!" she giggled.

"I'm probably going to need it today," he acknowledged, accepting the cup and taking a gulp of the still-hot coffee.

"Long night?"

"Long but boring," he told her with a nod. "Absolutely nothing exciting happened." He stifled a yawn. "And then after school today I've got to put in a couple hours at Agreste to get this whole Janet affair sorted out. I'm telling you, Princess, I'm not exactly upset about yesterday, but you did saddle me with a lot of paperwork!"

"Aww, is my poor Kitty scared of the big, bad paperwork?" she teased, wrapping and arm around his waist. "What if I make it up to you with a special dinner tonight after we get done at Agreste?"

"That sounds, _purr_-fect, My Lady," he agreed, squeezing her tightly. "Just the thing to see me through today! But I'll only have an hour or so to eat this evening; I'm supposed to meet up with Kagami for some extra fencing practice later tonight. There's a tournament this weekend, we need to be ready, and this is the only time that fits _both_ our schedules."

"That sounds like fun," Marinette hummed. "I haven't seen Kagami in forever. Maybe I'll come watch!"

"Are you sure, Bug?" he asked in surprise. "It's not like we'll be hanging out or anything. It's just going to be a ton of fencing."

"Oh, I'll see how I feel, I guess," she decided as they entered the building arm in arm.

* * *

"It feels weird to be walking into Agreste together and holding hands," Marinette whispered, leaning into his shoulder and glancing down at their interlaced fingers when the elevator let them out on Agreste's main office floor after school.

Adrien shrugged. "After yesterday, there's not much point to hiding it anymore, right?"

"I suppose not," Marinette agreed. "But still, what will people think?"

"Probably they'll think that I have good taste in women," Adrien joked, squeezing her hand.

"Maybe," Marinette agreed, flushing. She frowned. "Or they'll think I'm some gold-digger trying to take advantage of your name and reputation."

"What 'name and reputation'?" Adrien asked rhetorically, raising an eyebrow at her. "Father did a pretty good job of tarnishing the 'Agreste' name, and any reputation the 'Agreste' fashion house has at this point is thanks to _you_. Besides, you and I both know none of that is true. And it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks about our relationship as long as we know the truth."

"Maybe," Marinette conceded, though she was still not convinced.

When they arrived at Adrien's office door, he pulled her in for a hug and she gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. "Now to find us a new manager," he said with a grin. "Preferably one who _isn't_ going to torture the interns… Wish me luck!"

Marinette smiled after him as he closed the door before she turned to greet Mme Batteaux.

"It's so nice to see him _happy_ to come to work for once, dear," the older woman gushed, giving Marinette a big smile. "It makes my heart sing to see the two of you finally together!"

Marinette giggled in embarrassment. "Actually… we've really been dating since before his father was arrested. We were just trying to keep it quiet here until yesterday when we… well… couldn't," she explained, looking down at her feet.

"Ah, I understand." Mme Batteaux smiled wistfully. "Reminds me of when Gabriel and Emilie first started the company. They were so concerned about appearances that it took nearly a year before they would wear their wedding rings in public! So afraid of being branded a 'mom and pop fashion house.' Gabriel's designs won out in the end, of course. And so will yours, if I'm not mistaken!"

Marinette blushed at the compliment and thanked her before she headed down the hall toward the design team workroom. As she passed the Office Manager's office, she could hear the custodian, M. Lamblin, cleaning it out in preparation for its eventual new occupant. She was about to enter the design team room when Mme Legrand stuck her head out of the consultation room across the hall and called, "Ah, Marinette, just who I was looking for!"

"Sorry I'm late today," Marinette apologized.

"Don't worry about it, dear." Legrand waved a hand dismissively. "But I do need your design for the new summer tea dress as soon as possible. We've been going through the summer line all day to finalize everything, and that is the only piece missing."

Marinette grinned. "I was actually finishing it up last night when M. Janet…"

"Say no more," Legrand laughed. "Any delay from yesterday's business is well-worth the trade-off!"

"Oh, it is finished," Marinette assured her. "Just let me go grab it off my sketchpad and I'll bring it right in."

"Thank you, dear." Legrand closed the door as Marinette entered the design team room.

She stopped and stared at her desk in confusion. She approached the desk in a daze, staring at the flyer someone had left on all the desks in the room. "What is this?" She picked it up and quickly read through it. "'Open design contest for Agreste's new top designer'? What could this be about?" She looked across the desk. "Marie? Do you know anything about this?"

"Yeah!" Marie told her excitedly. "It was on everyone's desk this morning when I arrived. I guess M. Agreste is ready to really start moving forward and find a new top designer! I know you're just in lycée, but are you going to submit a design for it?"

Marinette stamped down her nervousness. "Um, yeah… of course…" _But I thought I was _already_ going to be Adrien's top designer… And what about Mme Legrand? Is she leaving now?_ She shrugged and pushed those thoughts aside. _It is still a few years early for that kind of decision, I guess. And Adrien probably can't make a decision like that out of the blue _or_ wait until we're both out of lycée, and this way it's fair to everyone, right? Besides, all anyone needs to do is look at one of my designs and they'll know I'm the best choice… right?_ She let out a breath to steel her resolve. _It doesn't matter. Maybe this way is better: If I'm going to be Agreste's top designer, I will _earn_ it for myself!_

She pushed the flyer aside, meaning to consider it further later, and went to grab her sketchpad, but hesitated when she saw over a dozen brochures sitting on top of it. Lacriox, Chanel, Givenchy… all the major Paris designers. All of them offering internships for lycée students. _What are these for?_ Marinette's heart dropped into her shoes. She had certainly considered applying to any of these companies in the past; her future dreams had always included an internship at one of the best fashion houses in Paris. But not like this. Now that she and Adrien were _partners_ in everything, now that she was interning at Agreste, helping Adrien behind the scenes as his creative partner, she didn't _want_ to work for anyone else. They may all have fine reputations, but they're not _Adrien_'s company – the company of which he kept telling her that she was the future. If she went to one of those other companies, what would a lycée internship look like? Would she be designing skirts, or would she be fetching coffee?

With this blow on top of the surprise "Open Competition" announcement, was Adrien trying to send her a message? Maybe after yesterday's confrontation with M. Janet, everything was ruined and Adrien thought it would be too distracting to have her at Agreste anymore. He'd held her hand on the way in today, he'd smiled when he saw her before school, but maybe that was just to ease the blow. Maybe this was his way of asking her to leave the company quietly so he could run it his way without her causing any more trouble when he found a new manager. But why wouldn't he have talked to _her_ if that was the case? Why act like nothing's wrong when something like _this_ was waiting at Agreste?

Marinette blinked when she saw drops on the Sorbier brochure that she had crumpled in her hand. With effort she stifled her sobs and wiped away her unshed tears with a sleeve. A quick glance showed that Marie had turned back to the shirt she was altering and all the other designers had their heads down and were focusing on their own projects. Marinette dropped into her seat, pushed the pile of brochures off the desk and onto the floor, and picked up her sketchpad. Even with these blows on her mind, at least she had her dress design to turn in. She opened the sketchpad to the last used page, and–

"No way."

She was looking at a psychedelic tuxedo she had designed (and toned down substantially from his initial suggestion) for Jagged Stone's next concert. The tea dress she had finished the day before had vanished. She quickly started skimming through the sketchpad. Maybe she had skipped a blank page. Maybe the dress was on the very last page. But as she flipped through the book from cover to cover, again and again, she finally had to face reality: the design was gone. She closed her eyes and forced herself to take a few calming breaths.

"Marie, did you see anyone near my desk today?" she asked when she had regained some semblance of control.

"No," she replied slowly, looking up at Marinette in onfusion. "No one's touched your desk while I've been here."

"My dress is missing, and I know it was in my sketchpad yesterday."

"Maybe Mme Legrand already picked it up?" Marie suggested.

"She asked for it when I arrived."

"Did you leave it out yesterday?"

"I don't think so."

"Could it have fallen on the floor? M. Lamblin wouldn't throw something like that away, but if it were on the floor…"

"I'm always so careful!" Marinette insisted. She could feel tears building in her eyes. "But with my luck… Ugh!" She grabbed her pigtails anxiously.

Marie gave her a sympathetic look. "Sorry, Marinette. I wish I knew."

At that moment Marinette's eye was drawn to Lieutenant Raincomprix and another police officer walking down the hallway toward Adrien's office. "As if this day couldn't get better," she muttered. "What's the police doing here?"

She didn't have to wait long to find out. It was only a few minutes later that Adrien walked past, Lieutenant Raincomprix's hand on his shoulder. Adrien looked outwardly confident, but Marinette could see the tension and anxiety in his posture, in the set of his jaw and the slight downturn of his mouth. She watched him walk past, willing him to look at her and give some reassurance, but his eyes remained focused straight ahead.

Marinette glanced down at her purse to see Tikki with her head popped out of the opening, mouth hanging open as she covertly watched Adrien being escorted off the floor. As if she could sense Marinette's gaze, Tikki glanced up at her. Marinette raised her eyebrows and gave a slight nod toward Adrien. Tikki nodded and dropped back into the purse, phasing through both the purse and the floor to follow Adrien. Marinette watched her go, hoping that she would be back in an instant to say that it was all just a misunderstanding, that he was simply showing them around the ground-floor store. But as the minutes ticked by and Tikki still didn't return, her worries returned full force.

She almost missed the sound of her phone's notification chime. She looked down to see that she had just received an email. There was no text, just an attachment. She opened the attachment, and dropped the phone with a strangled gasp.


	5. Chapter 5

_To anonymousfriend27: Some of the questions get answered… in the _next_ chapter. For now, there are still more questions to ask…_

* * *

Adrien smiled at the Marinette through the door, even after it had closed and he could no longer see her. On turning around, however, he looked around his office and groaned. He had added some personal touches to the office, but it still felt a little too _im_personal. His father's influence hung over everything, from the plain black curtains to the cold, sterile walls, devoid of any familiarity or warmth. _Maybe now that our relationship is "official" here, I should let Marinette redecorate the _office_! She's doing such a good job with the mansion…_ He smiled at the thought, making a mental note to ask her over dinner. But he couldn't worry about that now; the advertisement for his office manager position wasn't going to write itself.

He dropped into the office chair and spun around once before turning on his computer. While he waited for the computer to start up, he pulled a framed picture of himself and Marinette out of his desk drawer and set it on the desk where he could look at her all the time. "Another benefit of our relationship being 'official' now," he commented, smiling at it.

Plagg simply rolled his eyes and leaned against the picture frame, arms folded. "Don't tell me you're going to be all mushy over Pigtails _here_ now, too…"

"Don't lie to me, Plagg," Adrien chuckled. "I know how much you like her, and how much you like seeing us together."

"… I refuse to answer that," Plagg sputtered, "… at least without a whole batch of her father's camembert macaroons!" Plagg phased through the desk into "his" drawer. It wasn't too long before Adrien heard a contented sigh followed by a low purring that made the desk vibrate.

As soon as the computer had finished booting up, before he could start his work, a notification popped up from the company's intranet security program: a suspicious email received by someone at Agreste. Adrien furrowed his brow but opened the program anyways. Usually these were simple phishing attacks and the software stopped them dead in their tracks. Occasionally the program overreacted to an employee receiving a cat video. However, neither of these was the case.

"What?" Adrien breathed. "This can't be happening…"

He was looking at an email sent from a Givenchy email address… to Marinette's company email: "We have received your design submission and will contact you if it is accepted. Regarding your request for an internship, we regret to inform you that we do not currently have openings at the lycée level. However…"

Adrien pushed the computer away in disgust. Marinette? Submitting designs to another fashion house? Looking to leave her Agreste internship? Was it just too awkward after yesterday, now that he had made their relationship public? Had he ruined their chances of working together by pushing her into the spotlight yesterday? His eyes burned at the unfairness of it. He had thought that putting Janet in his place, firing him for everything he had done – to Marinette _and_ to the other employees – was the right thing to do, both for the company and for Marinette. But now it might be _hurting_ Marinette's future with the company! Would he have to continue this company without his partner by his side? But how could he do that?

He was just about to walk down and talk to Marinette in person when the phone buzzed and Mme Batteaux's voice came through, a trace of concern in her tone. "M. Agreste, you have visitors."

"Who is it?" he asked, frowning at the phone.

"Two police officers are here," she answered hesitantly. "They… say they have a judicial commission."

"Of course," he replied, swallowing hard. "Please send them in."

Adrien pasted his best model smile on his face as the door opened and Lieutenant Raincomprix stepped through, another officer trailing behind him. He rose from the desk and offered his hand, more out of politeness than any happiness at seeing them. "Officers," he greeted them. "To what do I owe this visit? Looking for something for Sabrina's birthday? I think Marinette's newest blouse design would be just her style! Or perhaps you are looking to commission Agreste to design new uniforms for the police force? Because I assure you, my team can do some amazing things with Kevlar!"

Lieutenant Raincomprix grimaced. "This… is awkward, Adrien," he finally confessed, pondering each word as it came out. He sighed heavily. "I wish I wasn't here right now, I really do. But we received an anonymous tip that Agreste's financial records are… incomplete. The tipster gave us some evidence, enough that a judge opened a judicial commission and empowered us to demand your financial records. I need you to hand over the records and computers, and I also need to ask you to come down to the station and answer some questions for us."

"Of course," Adrien replied nervously, speaking a little louder to drown out the low growl emanating from his desk. "Just let me call my attorney and make sure he agrees with what you are saying."

Without waiting for a response, Adrien called M. Renoir and explained what was happening. M. Renoir instructed him to cooperate with the officers but not to speak until he arrived. He promised to meet them at the police station.

"Very well, officers," Adrien told them after hanging up the phone. "I'm at your disposal."

* * *

Adrien couldn't keep his feet still while sitting in the police station and waiting for Lieutenant Raincomprix to return, Plagg rumbling quietly in his pocket. Beside him M. Renoir sat calmly, poring over the judicial commission documents and company financial records that Raincomprix had provided.

"You realize that is not conducive to my concentration, right?"

Adrien's foot stilled of its own accord. "Sorry, sir," he replied sheepishly. "I just fidget when I'm nervous. And being on this side of the table in a police interrogation room definitely qualifies…"

"I've only been here with you once," Renoir commented, raising an eyebrow. "After Gabriel's arrest."

"And that ended after three hours when the Heroes of Paris opened a portal over there, and Ladybug, Carapace, and Queen Bee walked into the room and personally insisted that they release me," Adrien confirmed. He smiled humorlessly. "That was definitely the highlight of the day."

"Still, you make it sound like this is a common occurrence. How many times _have_ you been in a police interrogation room?" Renoir wondered. "On _either_ side of the table?"

Adrien chuckled. "More often than you'd expect for a seventeen-year-old rich kid whose super-villain father would have literally murdered him if he stepped a toe out of line." He couldn't exactly explain that a few of those had been dressed as a cat… Attorney/client privilege or not, he and Marinette had both agreed that Renoir did _not_ need to know that!

_Marinette…_ Adrien hoped she wouldn't worry too much. He'd noticed Tikki hovering discretely in a corner of the lobby ceiling while the police were walking him out. Plagg had disappeared from his pocket for a few minutes while Lieutenant Raincomprix figured out the best way to avoid the press (he'd have to thank Sabrina for buying him at least _that_ much consideration). Plagg had returned before they left, so Adrien assumed that Marinette had some idea what was happening. But she couldn't know any more than he did, and he was still completely in the dark.

His foot started tapping again.

Renoir glanced over at him in annoyance, but the door opened before he said anything. Lieutenant Raincomprix walked in, sat down, and set a folder on the table between himself and Adrien. Adrien stopped moving at once and turned to look at the officer.

"I'm sorry for keeping you waiting," Raincomprix told them. "The accountant was going through your company finances to see if those anomalies were correct."

"And what reason do you have to believe my client committed a crime, if one has indeed been committed?" Renoir asked icily.

"Do you understand your company financial records, Adrien?" Raincomprix asked, ignoring the question.

At a nod from Renoir, Adrien replied, "I'm still learning, but I understand the basics. When I took over the company, M. Renoir advised me that I need to keep an eye on the company financial records so I don't get in trouble. Like I seem to be now," he added, grimacing.

"And your financial records are accurate?"

"Last time I checked. I still have no idea what any of this is about!" Adrien insisted.

Raincomprix flipped the folder open and slid it across the table. "Then how do you explain this?"

Adrien stared at the top sheet of paper. "I can't," he admitted. The paper showed a series of small withdrawals from Agreste's accounts, duplicating expense payments and occurring every few days over the months since he had taken control of the company. The next page showed Agreste's tax returns, which did not account for these withdrawals. From the number at the bottom of the first page, the total withdrawn was close to €1 million. "I don't remember seeing transactions like this. _I_ certainly didn't authorize any of these!"

"This doesn't look good," Raincomprix told him, frowning. "The accountant is still working his way through the shell companies these fraudulent transactions were funneled through, but his preliminary finding is that they all point back to you."

"What!?" Adrien sat up straight, ignoring Renoir's hand on his shoulder.

"My client categorically denies these accusations," Renoir interjected, cutting off Adrien's sputtering protest.

"Unfortunately, what we have is more than enough to open a preliminary enquiry into your company for financial fraud." Raincomprix sounded apologetic as he said it. "You'll have to stay here until we get this sorted out."

Adrien's jaw dropped and he could feel Plagg squirming in his shirt pocket.

"Is my client under arrest?" Renoir calmly asked.

"Not at the moment," Raincomprix admitted, leaning back in his chair.

"Do you have sufficient evidence to arrest him?"

"Once the forensic accountant finishes with the financial records, I believe we will," Raincomprix informed them, looking uncomfortable. He sighed and fidgeted with his hat. "For now, we have enough evidence to say that _someone_ was stealing from Agreste and that tax fraud has occurred. However, we cannot say definitively that Adrien himself was involved."

"Do you believe he is in danger of fleeing the country?" Renoir raised his eyebrows.

Raincomprix was silent.

"I assure you, my client has no intention of leaving while this investigation is going on. He has strong ties to the community, such as his many friends – including your own daughter, I might add – and his girlfriend, whose family has essentially adopted him as their own. He did not run away from them after you arrested his father, and he has no intention of doing so now."

Raincomprix's lip twitched in something like a smile. Nevertheless he said, "See that he does not."

* * *

"So what happens now?" Adrien asked. He and Renoir were sitting in the backseat of his car while the Gorilla weaved through the late-night traffic.

"The police will continue their investigation," Renoir told him, not looking up from his phone, "but that's not your concern at the moment. For right now, you are going to go to a certain bakery and try to relax – or as much as you can after spending over four hours in a police interrogation room."

Adrien nodded and sat through the rest of the ride in silence, not even acknowledging the other two men when the car stopped in front of the bakery and he got out. The bakery itself was dark, having closed several hours earlier, so he let himself in with his key and made his way slowly up the stairs to the apartment.

Marinette was waiting in the kitchen when he pushed the door open, Tikki sitting on the table in front of a small plate with cookies and cheese. Without a backward glance, Plagg phased out of Adrien's pocket and floated over to join her, ignoring the cheese and whispering to her urgently. As Adrien collapsed into a chair at the table, Marinette placed a bowl of soup in front of him.

"I'm sorry," she told him hesitantly. "It's not as fancy or special as what I was planning to make for you. I wasn't even sure you would come by tonight until M. Renoir texted from the car."

"That's okay," Adrien assured her. He laughed, but without any humor. "There were a few minutes _I_ wasn't sure I would be leaving the police station tonight!"

Marinette's eyes grew wider at the comment, and she didn't respond for a minute. "Mama and Papa went to bed a little bit ago," Marinette finally told him. "They need to be up early to prepare tomorrow's stock. And I asked them to give us a little time alone tonight. I hope that's okay; Mama said that if you needed a mother's hug, she would be out in an instant."

"I understand," Adrien assured her. "They do so much for me already; I don't want to impose any more than I already do."

They were quiet for a few minutes as Adrien ate. Eventually, however, Marinette broke the silence. "Tikki said this had something to do with Agreste's financial records?" she prompted.

He nodded. "Apparently they got a tip about embezzlement and tax evasion and when they examined our records they found some fraudulent transactions. But I don't remember seeing anything like that when I looked at the statements last month." He frowned in confusion.

"So what happens now?"

"I don't know." Adrien shrugged. "They keep on digging to see if they can tie any of it to me, and if they do, I guess Father and I get to share a cell." Marinette gasped and covered her mouth. Hearing the sound, he looked up at her and tried to smile. "It's not _so_ bad," he assured her. He barked out a derisive laugh. "Maybe seven to ten years behind bars together is just what we needed for our relationship: 'the family that does time together is just fine together,' or something like that!"

He studied Marinette's expression. Normally she was an open book to him, but there was something guarded about her expression. He recognized a dozen emotions in her face, but none stayed there for long. Was that guilt because she was trying to find a new internship? Was that anger at the situation? Was she upset about his near-arrest, or something else? They finished the late meal in awkward silence before Adrien helped her clean the dishes.

He was just about to go into his room when Marinette finally spoke again. She gave him a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes before giving him a stiff hug and saying, "Goodnight, Adrien." The hug only lasted a moment before she was disappearing up the stairs.

He watched her go with bemusement.

* * *

_I don't actually know the French legal system, but I tried to align this as much as possible with what Wikipedia says about it._


	6. Chapter 6

_To Rose Tiger: Don't worry, some of the answers are in this chapter._

_To GuenZhenXuan2020: Which lie do you mean? In chapter 5 or at the very beginning of the entire story? Adrien says Plagg's lying about being annoyed by how "cute" he and Marinette are. The bigger things do eventually get answered._

_To anonymousfriend27: The question of why they didn't talk it out already gets answered in this chapter. But it comes down to a question of timing and priorities._

_To Dragon Lord Draco: That gets answered eventually. It's a little more complicated than either of those options._

* * *

Alya sat across from Marinette at the dining room table in her parents' apartment, both hands wrapped around her steaming teacup. The twins were playing with their Heroes of Paris dolls in their bedroom, leaving the two girls free to talk. The Kwamis sat on the table between them sharing a croissant quietly. Marinette had her feet up on the chair, hugging her knees tightly as she stared into the depths of her own teacup. She'd been like that for the better part of an hour, refusing all of Alya's attempts to start a conversation.

At school that day, she and Nino had both realized right away that something was off with their two best friends. Although Marinette was polite and outwardly affectionate, she wouldn't look at Adrien for more than a minute at a time. Adrien for his part hadn't noticed her strange behavior; he was too distracted by his own thoughts. More often than she could count, Alya had witnessed Nino nudging Adrien under the desk so he would unclench his fists and pay attention to the lesson. After the final bell rang, Alya gave Nino a look and glanced over at Adrien meaningfully. Nino nodded and wrapped an arm around Adrien, steering him out of the room. _Divide and conquer it is_…

And all Alya had gotten from Marinette for her trouble so far was stony silence. "So…" Alya tried again, hesitantly, "what's going on with Adrien? School was weird today…"

Marinette stirred herself and groaned. "You're telling me! He was almost arrested for stealing from Agreste yesterday, and the only reason he wasn't was because his lawyer convinced the police to wait until they have actual evidence against him! But what if he _is_ arrested and it goes on his permanent record and he's never able to find a job again and no one will work for him so Agreste has to close and–"

"Whoa, whoa, girl!" Alya nearly shouted, interrupting Marinette mid-rant. "Slow down! There's no way Adrien would have done something like that! He's the richest kid in the school, and he also cares the least about money out of everyone we know! It has to be a misunderstanding, and they're going to sort it all out."

"Of course _that_'s all a misunderstanding," Marinette agreed, exasperated, "but that's not what's really wrong."

"So what _is_ really going on?" Alya pressed. "Please! I'm your best friend. You can tell me. Let me help you."

"It's just… I _refuse_ to believe that Adrien is cheating on me!"

"Wait, _what_?" Alya nearly shouted. Tikki and Trixx both jumped into the air at the noise; Tikki mirrored Alya's expression of slack-jawed shock. Alya continued, "Of course that boy isn't cheating on you, girl! He's head-over-heels in love with you. I know it. You know it. Everyone at school knows it. Hell, there are probably undiscovered tribes in the _jungle_ that know it! If you asked him to go and fight a giant octopus, he would evolve gills on the spot!"

"So you say…"

"So I know!" she insisted. "If he's a 'Sunshine Boy,' then you are his sun, girl."

"But what if he _is_ cheating on me?" Marinette demanded, lower lip quivering, pain clear in her eyes. "What if the reason he's been hanging out with Kagami so much lately isn't because of a fencing tournament but they're secretly planning to run off together and elope and move to Australia and have a pet kangaroo and–"

Alya groaned and glanced over at the two Kwamis. She raised an eyebrow at Tikki, who started out of her own dazed reverie, shut her mouth, and shook her head affectionately. Trixx just stifled an amused snort.

"–and then they'll have three children named–" Marinette cut off abruptly as Tikki slapped her gently on the cheek.

"Earth to Marinette…" Alya called, waving a hand in front of her face. "You're spiraling again. There's no way for any of that to be true. There's no way that Adrien would ever cheat on you!"

"But–"

"No 'buts'!"

"I have _proof_!" Marinette wailed.

"_What?_ What proof?" Alya demanded, suddenly feeling her anger build in spite of herself.

"He's looking to hire a new lead designer – after insisting all year that eventually he wants that to be me! He wants me out of Agreste; that's why he's leaving information for other fashion houses on my desk!"

Alya scoffed. "Isn't your design team room an open floor plan? Anyone could have left those things on your desk."

"But what about the picture?" Marinette retorted.

That got Alya's attention. "There's a picture? Of what?"

"Adrien. At a fancy restaurant," Marinette answered, bottom lip trembling with every syllable. She pulled out a picture she had printed off and stuck in her purse. "With another girl."

Alya's jaw dropped as she looked at the photo, Tikki hovering next to her head. Adrien could clearly be seen sitting in a fancy restaurant, smiling across the table at a girl who looked about their own age. The girl faced away from the camera, and Alya couldn't make out any distinguishing features beyond her dark hair. "I-I don't believe it… have you confronted him about this yet?" asked Alya.

Marinette shook her head. "How could I?" she asked, tears starting to pool in the corners of her eyes. "I only received the email after he was taken in for questioning. Then when he came to the bakery after leaving the police station, he told me they had nearly arrested him! I couldn't throw something like _this_ at him on top of everything else! He needed my support! What kind of girlfriend would I be if I accused him of cheating on me or broke up with him when he had literally just avoided being arrested?"

"But why didn't you say anything to _me_?" Tikki demanded, eyes flashing. "My _partner_ spends every moment with him, and he would tell me the truth… if that mangy cat knows what's good for him!"

Marinette just shrugged. "You were talking to Plagg when I saw the picture, and when you came back, the police thing just seemed more important."

"Sometimes you are just too nice for your own good, girl," Alya told her, shaking her head. "I think you would have been completely justified in getting the truth about this yesterday, police or no. If he actually _did_ something like this, he wouldn't deserve your support in the other thing. And if he _didn't_ do it, you deserve to know that so you really _can_ support him, not this half-hearted thing you were doing today.

"But back to the photo. Did it come with a note or anything?"

"Nothing." Marinette's shoulders slumped. "But the photo itself has a timestamp from two nights ago. When he said he was going to go straight home to the mansion to hang out with Nino and stay there for the night instead staying at the bakery."

"Wait… _two_ nights ago?" Alya pressed, looking at the bottom corner of the photo to confirm. On seeing the timestamp for herself, Alya burst out laughing.

"Alya!" Marinette moaned, tugging on her pigtails. "It's not funny! My boyfriend lied to me and went out with another girl – and _your_ boyfriend must've known about it! My life is over!"

"Actually," Alya admitted, wiping tears from her eyes, "it really _is_ kind of funny! You see, he actually _was_ out with another girl that night. And I know who he was 'cheating on you' with…"

"What? Who?" Marinette demanded, glaring at her.

"Mylène," Alya replied smugly.

"_WHAT_?" Marinette's jaw dropped open in shock and she nearly dropped her teacup. "She would do that? To Ivan? To _me_? I gave that girl a _Miraculous_!"

"Hold up, girl," Alya cautioned as Marinette started rooting in her purse for her cell phone. "Don't go on the warpath just yet. Does the girl in this photograph look anything like Mylène? Adrien traded patrol nights with me at the last minute. Nino won tickets to a concert that night, and Adrien agreed to take my patrol so Nino and I could have a last-minute date. So Adrien spent the whole night patrolling with Multiplice, _not_ meeting up for some late-night rendezvous with his 'side piece.'"

"Wait, so you're saying that this photo is…"

"A fake," Alya confirmed with a nod. "Trixx?" The Kwami darted over to the supply drawer while Alya grabbed a water bottle from the counter. She held the photo up to the light, using the water bottle as a makeshift magnifying glass. "I saw this in a movie once," she explained. She studied Adrien's image carefully, as well as everything around him. Nothing caught her attention until she examined his eyes. By then Trixx had returned with a ruler and pencil. Alya placed the photo on the table and started drawing lines on the photo, adjusting the ruler each time.

"Alya, what are you doing?" Marinette asked, leaning over her shoulder carefully to avoid blocking her light.

"Something is off in the lighting on Adrien," Alya answered, not looking up from her work. "You can just barely see light in his eyes, like he was looking into the camera flash, but the light source for the rest of the picture is clearly to the side, not in front of him. Shoot," she muttered. "It's got to be a fake, but it's very expertly-done. If I didn't already know he had an alibi, I probably wouldn't have bothered looking close enough to realize. If you send me the original file I can definitely confirm it with my photo-analysis software. But it has to be a fake. We can still check with Mylène, but he was definitely on patrol with her all night. I even saw them on the roof when we left the concert."

Marinette tapped a few buttons on her phone before she let out a relieved sigh and slumped back into her chair. She furrowed her brow and stared at Alya. "But what about the fashion house applications? The lead designer contest?"

"Does that really sound like something Adrien would do to you?" Alya demanded, opening her laptop. "If the two of you had a problem, wouldn't he talk it out with you?"

Marinette nodded, wide-eyed.

"Have you gotten any hint of trouble in paradise before today, girl?"

Marinette shook her head. "Just the opposite," she admitted. "The same day this photo was supposedly from, our office manager tried to fire me."

Alya's eyebrows shot up. "Wait, that jerk tried to _fire_ you?"

Marinette nodded. "I called him out for mistreating another intern. He dragged me into Adrien's office and everything. I honestly thought Adrien was about to Cataclysm him, he was so furious."

"That doesn't sound like a boy who's trying to replace you – in the design room _or_ the bedroom!"

"Alya!" Marinette squealed, flushing crimson.

Alya giggled. "Relax, girl," she told her. "I already know you're both too pure for that. But you should be happy: your 'happily ever after' is still on!"

"I know." Marinette groaned and buried her face in her hands. "I just – I can't believe I jumped to _this_! How could I have doubted Adrien like that? How could I have believed this about him, and after everything we've been through together? I – the last day or so, ever since I saw that photograph, I've been distant from him. I've pulled back because I was afraid he was going to hurt me, and right now is when he needs my support more than anything else, what with these accusations hanging over him."

Alya spun the laptop around to face her. "If it's any consolation, this photograph was doctored so well it barely registered on my software – I might have just chalked it up to photo quality. And this program is designed to catch most forms of photo alteration, even if all I normally use it on are amateur five-minute self-insert PhotoShop jobs. But whoever did this really knew what they were doing. This–this was done by a professional. Again, if we didn't already know for a fact where he was when this picture was supposedly taken, we never would have figured it out.

"The fact is, whoever did this knew exactly how to get to you, Mar. They attacked you as a designer, and they attacked your relationship with Adrien."

"All the same," Marinette vowed, anger flashing in her eyes, fists clenched so tightly around her teacup Alya feared it might break, "I'm never going to fall for something like this again. There is no way I'm letting something like this get between me and Adrien ever again! And if I catch the person who _did_ this…"

"Slow down, girl," Alya told her, shooting off a quick text. "You can plot your revenge later. I'll even help. But as soon as Sabrina gets her to watch the twins for an hour or two, I think we need to go over to the mansion. Nino said Max was going to join him and Adrien to play video games tonight to keep Adrien's mind off of things. Nino seemed pretty excited about it, especially after they canceled on Monday. It's too bad, really, because that's not going to be happening now."

"And why is that?"

Alya smirked and raised her eyebrows at her suggestively. "Because Max is going to be too engrossed in helping me untangle this little web of yours. And _Adrien_'s going to be too engrossed in _you_!"

"_Alya_!"


	7. Chapter 7

_To Dragon Lord Draco: I write the entire story before publishing a single chapter. Every so often I make a change in the middle of publishing (I added a chapter early in "Running out of Time" that I'd partially-written and discarded), but for the most part all that's ever left is rereading/editing before publishing. The only exception (since starting on Miraculous fan fiction) is "An Adrienette Anthology," which is just a series of one-shots._

_To Speckleflower: After ripping them apart so much in the last 2½ chapters, they need at least a _little_ resolution… Which brings us to this chapter._

_To anonymousfriend27: After this chapter, the rest of the story is going to be Alya's perspective!_

* * *

"You _do_ realize the point of this game is to _win_, right, Agreste?"

Adrien grunted as his character – Weredad for this round – was thrown off the platform by Max as Stoneheart. "Shut up, Nino," he growled. "I don't see _you_ doing any better!" And sure enough, Nino's Lady Wifi followed Weredad a moment later.

"Yes!" Max whooped, pumping his fist in the air. "You have nothing on me!"

"Two-against-one and you _still_ wipe the floor with us! It's not fair," Nino complained. "You _wrote_ the game. You _lived_ the game, even!" He flipped around the menu a couple times before finally settling on Bubbler for the next round. He glanced over at Adrien. "Come to think of it, you did, too, dude! You should be way better than this."

"You lived it, too," Adrien retorted, gesturing toward the screen.

"As a _character option_," Nino shot back, "not as a _player_!"

"Marinette's the one who won the game that time, and she crushes me almost every time we play," Adrien confessed, shrugging. "You have to admit, though, it's a brilliant premise. So far everyone you've given it to loves it, Max. Have you considered selling copies?"

Max shrugged. "I have considered the possibility, but it is not feasible at this moment. I calculate that it would take at least €50,000 of startup money to finish the graphics, commission the audio, and purchase the equipment to mass-produce copies."

"What if I front you the startup money and get Kitty Section to record the music?"

"Is that a serious offer? What do you want in return?"

"Split the profits, with my half divided between the Akuma Victims' Charity and paying back the startup? Then when that's repaid, put that portion toward the Heroes' budget?"

"Deal!"

"Are you going to add any of the new Akumas from after you wrote the game?" Nino asked. "Startrain, Party Crasher, Oni-Chan, Mind Games…"

"Perhaps," Max nodded. "I suppose since Hawk Moth is gone I do not need to worry about the game becoming outdated as more Akumas appear."

"That's true," Adrien agreed. He snapped his fingers. "But you could make a follow-up or mod kit to add some of Impératrice Pourpre's Akuma heroes, once there are a few more of them. The Fairy Princess and Guitar Hero were both pretty cool. Chloe would probably demand royalties for Worker Bee, though!"

"Then we could answer the age-old question," Nino added. He grinned at their confused looks. "Who would win in a fight: Guitar _Villain_ or Guitar _Hero_?"

"I suppose we can already answer the _other_ question," Adrien chuckled. "Who would win between Ladybug/Antibug and Cat Noir/Copycat? Answer: whichever one Max chooses!" He finally decided on Stormy Weather for the next round.

"Why not just add in all the heroes in the first place?" Nino asked. "You could even give it a campaign mode to actually defeat Hawk Moth!"

"Would that include both Akumatized _and_ non-Akumatized versions of Guitar Hero?" Adrien wondered.

"A campaign mode would increase the expense," Max objected. "I estimate another €30,000 in graphics and coding just for the campaign as a single-player, to say nothing of writing a multiplayer version or programming the Heroes."

"What you have now is amazing as-is," Adrien assured him. "We're just fan-boying now. Besides, a campaign mode to defeat Hawk Moth which included Impératrice Pourpre as a hero who can Akumatize helpers _for_ the other heroes would seriously break the continuity!"

They played in silence for a few minutes, the only sound Nino's frustrated grunt as Max's Sandboy floated over a stream of bubbles and Stormy Weather was nearly caught in the crossfire.

"The Kwamis have been awfully quiet since they disappeared to raid the kitchen," Nino commented eventually. "Should we be worried?"

"Nah," Adrien replied. "Though Mme Lenoir might get annoyed tomorrow if they leave a mess!"

Just as Stormy Weather was about to call down a tornado to throw Sandboy off the platform, Adrien's bedroom door flew open. Adrien and Nino both turned to look, identical expressions of surprise on their faces, as Marinette and Alya entered the room. At that moment the game beeped, signaling the end of the round. Turning back, Adrien saw that Sandboy had hit a combo, launching his pillow at the Bubbler and sending him crashing into Stormy Weather, knocking both of them off the platform.

"Hey!" Adrien whined. "That's no fair! We were distracted!"

"Yeah," Nino added. "I was…"

When Nino's comment trailed off, Adrien glanced over at him, to see him with his eyes still fixed on the doorway, a concerned expression in his face. Looking at the girls more closely, he saw the same expression mirrored on Alya's face. Alya had one arm wrapped around Marinette's shoulders, and Marinette for her part looked close to tears.

"You have only yourselves to blame, gentlemen," Max began. "After all, you _were_ distracted by your… by your own… girlfriends…" he finished lamely, turning to find out why the room had gotten so quiet.

Nino finally broke the silence, asking, "Um, babe, who died?"

"Huh?" Alya nearly jumped. "Oh, no, nothing like that!" She gave a high-pitched laugh. "No one died. But… it's a good thing your game just ended because I really need to borrow Max for something. Something _heroic_? As in, down in Headquarters?"

"Of course," Max agreed, bemused, standing up from the couch and walking over to the door. "I would be happy to assist."

"Nino, you should probably come, too," Alya told him, giving him a pointed look.

"No way, babe." Nino shook his head and nodded over at Adrien. "My brother needs me."

Alya stared at him for a moment before she rolled her eyes affectionately, walked over to him, grabbed his arm, and dragged him, protesting, from the room. "Your brother is going to _literally_ have his hands full in about fifteen seconds," she hissed. "They really don't need an audience for this, babe." She shut the door behind them, cutting off Nino's reply.

When they were alone, Adrien examined Marinette closely, waiting for her to say something. She hadn't moved since entering the room. Her eyes were guarded, but he could see hints of fear, guilt, and self-loathing in them. She chewed on her lower lip anxiously as she stared at him wide-eyed, hugging herself tightly.

At last Adrien spoke first to break the silence. "Wow, Alya sure is something else, right?" he chuckled uncomfortably, running a hand through his hair. "I don't remember the last time I saw her get _this_ intense…"

Marinette didn't respond for a long minute. Adrien was about to walk over to her when her expression suddenly crumbled. She ran to him, tears streaming down her face, and threw herself into his chest. Unprepared for the sudden assault, Adrien was thrown off-balance. He couldn't keep them upright; the best he could manage was to guide them down to land on the couch. He tipped over the armrest and landed on his back across the cushions. Marinette sprawled on top of him with her arms wrapped tightly around his chest, tears falling hard and fast, her chest heaving as she cried. She pulled herself up and peppered his face with kisses between sobs. Adrien simply lay on the couch in bemusement and held her close, rubbing circles in her back and allowing her to release whatever emotions had caused this display.

When Marinette's breathing had evened out and she'd stopped kissing him and instead buried her face in his chest, Adrien gave her a gentle squeeze and asked, "What's wrong, Princess?"

"I'm s-sorry," Marinette sobbed into his shirt. "I'm s-so sorry."

"What are you sorry about?" he wondered. "If you're sorry about getting tears and makeup all over my shirt, I promise I'm not upset about that! If you're sorry about the whole Givenchy thing, I think they're making a mistake; they would be lucky to have you."

Marinette stopped sobbing immediately. She looked up and furrowed her brow. "What about Givenchy?"

"The online security system flagged the email you received from them yesterday," he explained. "About the design you submitted and your internship request that they denied because they didn't have lycée-level internships."

"I never received an email from _Givenchy_," Marinette told him indignantly. "And I never contacted them in the first place! _Or_ sent them a design! Why would I?"

Adrien shrugged. "That's what the email said."

"And anyways," Marinette went on, "the brochure on my desk said Givenchy _did_ have lycée internships available."

"Brochure?"

"There was a whole stack of them waiting for me yesterday, right under a flyer for the Lead Designer competition," she answered.

Adrien's jaw dropped. "_What_ Lead Designer competition?" he demanded.

Her eyes widened slightly. "You didn't do that?"

"Of course not!" Adrien insisted. "Why would I need to hold a competition to find _you_? If… I mean… if you're still with me?" he added hesitantly.

Marinette squeezed his chest tightly, burying her face in his shirt. "Of course I'm still with you, Kitty," she told him. "You're my partner. In everything."

"Good," Adrien breathed, running a hand through her hair. He swallowed. "I… I was a little worried. Agreste needs you… _I_ need you."

She hugged him so hard his ribs started to ache. "I need you, too."

"So what are you sorry for?" he asked, rubbing her back.

"I'm sorry I didn't trust you," she confessed into his chest. "I'm sorry I believed that you would cheat on me."

"_What_?"

She pushed herself up above his chest on her elbows so she could look him in the eyes. "I… received a picture," she explained hesitantly, guilt clear in her eyes. "It came in an email yesterday, right after you were escorted out of the building. It showed you out with another girl the night before."

"Two nights ago?" he asked in confusion. "But I was–"

"–on patrol with Multiplice," Marinette finished. "I know. Alya told me about the switch, and we called Mylène on the way over. But you weren't at my house that night, and then the next day you were talking about Kagami, and she's so much more 'high society' than me, and–"

Adrien leaned forward and silenced her with a kiss. "You are the only girl for me. You are beautiful and creative and fearless. You are strong in ways I can only hope to be. You push me and inspire me to be the best I can be. You forgave me for my mistake over the summer. You stood by me and supported me when Father was arrested and all of Paris hated me. I could never find a better friend, partner, or girlfriend than you, Bugaboo. I would never betray you. I love you far too much to do that to you."

"You might need to say that a couple more times before it actually sinks in," Marinette muttered, her cheeks turning a light pink.

"I will tell you all of that and more every waking minute of every day for the rest of our lives," Adrien assured her, pulling her down into a tight hug.

"I just feel so foolish for believing such a thing of you," Marinette mumbled. Adrien felt fresh tears soaking into his shirt.

"Milady," he told her, "if I ever cheat on you, you have my permission to beat me senseless and tie me upside-down to the top of the Eiffel Tower!"

"What?" she yelped. "I could never do that to you!"

"I would," Plagg interjected calmly, having just returned from the kitchen and coming to hover over the couch.

"Plagg!" Adrien admonished. "You wouldn't!"

Tikki phased out of the purse Marinette had dropped at the side of the couch and crossed her arms. "He would," she assured them, looking truly angry for the first time since Adrien had met her. "And I would help!"

"Tikki?" Marinette squeaked.

"And the same is true for _you_, if you ever break your partner's heart!" Tikki glowered at her. She threw her arms up in exasperation. "Honestly, it's hard enough finding holders who work well together _in_ the masks, but to find two who are so good for each other in every _other_ part of their lives, too… Ugh! To think someone would try to destroy this partnership!"

Plagg put an arm around Tikki and steered her away from the couch, toward the bookcases. "Sorry," he called, stifling a grin. "She gets like this every couple hundred years or so… Now that I think about it, I think the last time was over her _last_ French holder…"

Tikki allowed him to lead her away, muttering and gesticulating all the way. "… they thought the _Black Death_ was bad? Oh, if I ever get my hands on whatever _lowlife_ tried to turn those two against each other… I have half a mind to _create_ some painful sores on their–" Plagg cackled as the two phased into a drawer together.

Adrien stared after them. "Should we be worried?" he finally asked. "I mean, the literal embodiments of Creation and Destruction just threatened us with bodily harm if we ever break up, so…"

Marinette giggled. "I guess that means we're stuck with each other, Kitty."

He pulled her in close and gazed softly into her eyes. "You know I wouldn't have it any other way, Milady."

* * *

_If Plagg can be responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs _and_ destruction of Atlantis, why can't Tikki have created the Black Death as retribution for the death of Joan of Arc?_


	8. Chapter 8

_To GuenZhenXuan2020: Not as an additional power of the Ladybug Miraculous, but more as an application _of_ Tikki's power (with or without her holder's involvement). Plagg's power unrestrained can cause untold _destruction_, so what would unrestrained _creation_ look like? I don't think Marinette is _quite_ at the point of unleashing a plague on Europe just to get Lila! Yet…_

_To Rose Tiger: Considering everything they've been through, it would take a lot to ruin their relationship at this point!_

_To anonymousfriend27: That's a fair point. Adrien's comment to her about Givenchy was something of a tacit acceptance of whatever decision she might make in that regard. But the question of Marinette being pushed out or deciding to leave became such a minor thing for them after the "I'm being arrested" and "Adrien's cheating on me" issues that learning the truth allowed them to move past it, especially since neither of them had given any outward indication of discontent with Marinette's role at Agreste. Remember, if it hadn't been for the non-arrest, they would have cleared everything else up in about 30 seconds!_

_To Dragon Lord Draco: I hadn't thought too much about "Angry Tikki" before reading it in a couple other stories. Then I started thinking about what "weaponized creation" might look like…_

_To sierranevadas84: Thanks for catching that! You are correct that the Black Death first arrived in Europe in the mid-1300s, but it returned many times between the 14__th__ and 17__th__ centuries. I was thinking of the 1500s, but checking on this I found an outbreak in the 1460s in Paris that killed about 40,000 people. Then in the 1470s there were two huge outbreaks in England. So maybe those three were "Tikki's Revenge"?_

* * *

Alya started pacing the length of the butterfly garden, Trixx resting on her shoulder, the moment she reached the Headquarters level while waiting for Max and Nino to join her. Normally the calm environment could soothe her nervous energy, but this evening it just gave her time to think. She had tried to be her usual, confident self for Marinette's sake – the girl had gone through enough drama with this situation on her own without Alya feeding it. Now, in the privacy of the butterfly garden, with only Trixx for company, Alya could allow herself to really consider her worst fears.

Someone had sent that photograph to Marinette intentionally. They had gone to enormous lengths to make it look legitimate, good enough to possibly even fool Alya herself if Marinette had shared it – no, it _would_ have fooled Alya under any other circumstances. But why? Why go to such lengths? What did they have to gain from it? Alya knew she didn't have all the facts yet, but her mind couldn't stop racing ahead with rampant speculation.

The elevator plate slipped into the ground with a whoosh, and Alya turned around to see Max and Nino jogging toward her, Kaalki and Wayzz hovering behind them.

"Seriously, babe, what's wrong?" Nino asked, stopping in front of her and looking at her in concern. "You haven't said anything, you stormed off without waiting for us to collect the Kwamis… Something's wrong."

Alya ignored the question and fixed Max with her most intense look. "Max, I emailed you a photograph. I need to know _everything_ you can give me, down to the photographer's _shoe size_. My program found a couple tiny anomalies, but barely enough to register. I _know_ it's a fake, but it is _good_."

"… Right," Max agreed. He opened his mouth to ask a question, thought better of it on seeing her expression, and disappeared toward his lab.

Alya grabbed Nino's hand and dragged him along with her as she paced the garden. "Something isn't adding up in all of this," she muttered. "The photo is obviously a fake, but it's too _professional_. And the timing… Marinette gets a picture of Adrien supposedly cheating on her at a time they aren't together, and it arrives right after he was not-arrested by the police–"

"Wait, Adrien _cheating_?" Nino interrupted, indignant. "Not my brother. No way."

"Of course he wasn't, he was on patrol at that time," Alya retorted, waving her hand dismissively as they turned to retrace their steps. "Try to keep up, babe. Obviously whoever sent the picture didn't know that. If they knew he was Cat Noir, they would have picked a better time, when he didn't have such a clear alibi. So their identities are safe. 'Alibi'… if he wasn't on patrol, he _wouldn't_ have had an alibi!" She turned on Nino. "How did you win those tickets?"

He shrugged. "It was a radio contest. I got a call that evening from someone at the radio station, right before I called you. Why?"

"Convenient," Alya muttered, leaning against the pod next to the lab. "Suddenly Adrien's 'alibi' disappears on him. But why would someone go to such lengths to break up Adrien and Marinette?"

"I have no idea."

Alya wasn't paying attention to him. "Whoever it was, _why_ever it was, they miscalculated." She slammed her fist on the pod and chuckled to herself. "It's a good thing, too. They didn't realize Marinette is too _nice_ for her own good. Any other girl probably would have dumped Adrien right off after seeing that picture, but not her. Of course she couldn't do something like that on top of the police thing."

"If you're done shooting blind, I think Max has something," Nino told her pointedly, wrapping an arm around her waist and guiding her to the lab door, where Max was waving to them.

On entering the lab they saw a pair of metal boots sitting on the table in the middle of the room with wires and diodes all around them. A number of wrist gauntlets lay next to the boots in various states of disassembly, with Markov hovering over them and chirping to himself. Max led them past the table to his computer, where he quietly pointed to a monitor showing a blown-up version of the same picture Alya had seen before. Various lines and shapes had been superimposed over it.

"What am I looking at?" Alya asked, leaning in to examine the image.

Max pressed a button and the lines disappeared. "This is the image that you sent me, correct?" When Alya nodded, he pressed another button. "These lines, as you know, show where the light source would have to be to create the shadows on the picture." When she nodded, he pressed another button. "And this shows an approximation of the shape that would have created these shadows if they were to align with the rest of the picture, given that Adrien was added in digitally."

"So it's confirmed?"

"The metadata does not lie," Max told her simply. He pulled up a page of coding on his second monitor and pointed out a few figures. "Whoever did this covered their tracks well. But I am better. These values here were repaired incorrectly. The image was definitely manipulated digitally. They did it _really_ cleverly, however: instead of adding Adrien entirely, they superimposed his image from a different photograph over that of another person so the shadows would still be there. Unfortunately for them, the original model was a centimeter taller than Adrien."

"This arrived right after Adrien was taken in by the police," Alya told him. "My gut tells me that's not a coincidence. What do you need to check the police investigation?"

"Seven seconds and a smart phone," Max replied, smirking. "That is only for what the police have online; anything that is not online will require a phone call to Lieutenant Raincomprix."

Markov flew over and projected the police report onto the wall. "The police log shows that they received a tip regarding suspicious financial activity," he reported, highlighting the line in question. "A forensic accountant is in the process of going through their financial records, but his report is not yet available online."

"Max?" Alya raised an eyebrow at him.

"Give me five minutes," Max promised, turning to the keyboard and cracking his knuckles.

Alya and Nino quietly walked around the butterfly garden while waiting for Max to summon them back. Alya stopped by the grotto containing the miracle box and slumped against the wall, sliding down to the ground and burying her face in her hands. Nino sat next to her, wrapped an arm around her shoulder, and squeezed her reassuringly.

"Trixx says I'm supposed to be able to see through illusions," she confessed. "He says that a Fox Miraculous holder not only creates illusions to suit their own needs, but also helps the rest of the team by cutting through the falsehoods and false fronts put up by the team's enemies. The team with a good Fox is rarely deceived, because the Fox is too sly to fall for the illusion of a smooth lie."

"Sounds like exactly what you want to be," Nino told her.

"And that's why you are becoming such a good Fox, Alya," piped up Trixx, floating over from where he had been stalking a butterfly. He sat on her shoulder and nuzzled into her hair.

She snorted and continued staring at the ground. "Then why does it feel like we're chasing our tails? This conspiracy is so spread out, so diverse, we can't get a handle on it."

"We're not talking about Adrien and Marinette anymore, are we?"

"Maybe we are; maybe we're not. That's the _problem_!" Alya nearly shrieked the last word, slamming her fist into the grass. "We don't know if this is Lynchpin, or if it's a coincidence. We don't know _how_ bad the conspiracy is, just that it's bad. It's a squid with its tentacles in everything. Every time we cut one off, a dozen more grow back. And while our team is out there chopping off tentacles left and right, Nora's no closer to finding the heart."

A small voice coughed in front of them, and they looked up to see a slightly-put-out Kaalki hovering at their eye-level. "If you're done freaking out," she drawled, "Max found something for you." The Kwami turned her tail and led the way back to the lab, muttering, "Although why he couldn't deliver his _own_ message instead of using me as his own personal Pony Express I will never understand!"

Max had pulled up two different sets of financial numbers on his computer screens and was hurriedly highlighting specific transactions. He didn't turn around when they entered but simply pointed to the screens. "Whoever did this certainly was thorough."

"'Whoever…'" Alya repeated. "So Adrien is innocent." At a look from Nino she hastily added, "I mean, we already knew that, but it's nice to have _evidence_."

"They uploaded a virus into Agreste's server that wiped and replaced their records from the ground up. Everything is exactly the same, but they seamlessly added in all of these duplicate transactions. I suspect the bank records were also altered to match, but it will take more time to confirm that."

"Is that Agreste's backup?" Alya asked, pointing to the other screen.

Max shook his head. "The electronic backup on Agreste's own servers received the same treatment as the original. I suspect the paper copy in the office was replaced as well. As I stated, they were exceedingly thorough. No, this is the backup from _our_ server. We are fortunate that the virus did not find our backdoor and exploit it to alter this copy. If it had, we may never have found or recovered the altered data. As it is, the original had only a couple points of metadata out of order to cue me in to the alteration, something that most people would simply overlook."

"So do you know who did it?" asked Nino.

Max hesitated. "I… have a suspicion – and it is approximately 67% certain – but I still lack sufficient evidence to confirm it." He switched windows and pointed to a line of code. "This is the virus that altered the financial records. An identical virus attacked the security system and wiped and replaced 80 minutes of footage. Markov is working on recovering it as we speak. But the interesting piece is this line here. It has popped up in several viruses recently, one of which was likely a prank. In that instance it attacked the PC version of Ultimate Mecha Strike IV and caused all of the characters to transform into spiders. The hacker responsible, as you would expect, goes by the name–"

"Spider," Alya finished, a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Max stared at her in surprise. "You have heard of him?"

"Only that he's working with some bad people."

Markov chirped excitedly and flew over to them. "I finished with the security footage!" he exclaimed, projecting the image. "There's still too much corruption in the video file for it to be any use, but I was able to recover this still image. Someone was in the building between 0117 and 0234 two nights ago. They erased the record of the computer in Adrien's office turning on, but failed to erase the record of it turning off."

"We've got them!" Nino shouted, pumping his fist.

"Not so fast, babe," Alya told him, putting a hand on his shoulder and frowning.

"Can't we just show all of this to the police?" he asked in surprise.

"Sure, Max could open a portal straight to the police station and drop all the evidence on Lieutenant Raincomprix's desk. Then he would ask how and why the Heroes have such high-level access to Agreste's computer system, including a remote backup of all Adrien's computer files, financial records, _and_ security footage. What do we tell him then?"

"We could say we hacked in," Nino offered.

"That's illegal, and it still would only give us access to the altered records, _not_ the originals from our own server," she reminded him. "Besides, that would be admitting that we were looking into this when it hasn't made the news yet and the police haven't requested our help. That looks bad for Adrien – almost as bad as if we were to tell them a half-truth and say that he gave us backdoor access to his computer system months ago! At best we would throw suspicion on Adrien all over again for aiding and abetting his father's crimes by suggesting that we thought we needed to keep tabs on the former Hawk Moth's company. At worst, the police realize that either we are friends of Adrien's or Adrien is himself a hero, possibly unmasking all of us and compromising our Headquarters. And I'm honestly not sure which is the best-case scenario and which is the worst-case!"

"What shall I do now?" Max asked, shuffling uncomfortably.

"See if you can find any usable evidence that doesn't tie directly back to us," she instructed. "And track down the accounts that money was funneled through. Whoever did this is going to come for the money eventually, and that could lead us back to _their_ accounts – and if we're lucky, back to _them_. And in the meantime we can at least give Adrien's company its money back and clean out whatever's in these accounts right now."

"But what are we going to do for Adrien?" Nino pressed.

Alya groaned in frustration. "If the worst comes to the worst and they do arrest him, we hand everything over to the police and deal with the consequences. Marinette would skin all of us alive for it, but hopefully Sabrina or Chloe could smooth some of it over through their fathers. But for now, I think I need to pay someone a visit. Send that security picture to Adrien and Marinette, and tell them to call me if they recognize who it is."

Nino raised an eyebrow at her. "Does this mean I'm on babysitting duty tonight?"

"This means you're on babysitting duty tonight."

* * *

_The pod next to Max's lab is the alien vessel they found in "An Interrupted Date." Regarding the speed with which Max can access police files, that was set up after Hawk Moth's defeat (in the Epilogue to "Mind Games")._


	9. Chapter 9

_AN: Kwamis cannot be filmed or recorded, but I don't think they ever established that they can't be heard over a phone. And since Rena Rouge is transformed, we can say that Miraculous communicators are the exceptions. And if you are curious how Tikki and Plagg can call Rena Rouge on her Miraculous communicator, the answer is "Max." For any tech-based questions in this universe, the answer is usually "Max."_

_To Rose Tiger: Yeah… about that "suspense" thing…_

_To Dragon Lord Draco: Depends on what you mean by "done done." "The Fashion Disaster" is completely written, but I haven't written anything beyond there. My "real job" is in a busy season at the moment, so I won't be able to put as much time into writing for the next month or so as I had been. There will be a bit of a delay before I publish the next big story, but there's plenty more to tell!_

_To Speckleflower: I know computers, but the photo analysis actually came from a web page on the subject that showed up on my homepage while writing that scene. The virus "signature" is something I did in one of the early Avengers FF stories I published on here._

_To anonymousfriend27: I'm glad someone caught that Lt. Raincomprix was uncomfortable interrogating Adrien!_

* * *

"You're sure about this?" Rena Rouge asked.

"For the fifteenth time, I'm positive," Plagg drawled over her communicator. "I _could_ check with Lover Boy and Pigtails, but they're pretty well occupied at the moment." He started making kissing noises before abruptly cutting off in a strangled yelp.

"Plagg!" a high-pitched voice squeaked. Rena Rouge pulled the flute away from her ear a few centimeters while the Kwamis squabbled. "They're resting together on the couch," Tikki explained momentarily. "We thought we shouldn't bother them."

"Honestly, this is exactly what I expected when I told Max to text them," Rena Rouge commented, chuckling. "Thanks for the help. If they ask, tell them not to worry. Tell them all their legal problems should be… dealt with… tonight," she added ominously. She disconnected the call without waiting for a reply and surveyed the apartment building in front of her.

Plagg's lead had led her to this apartment building in a high-class neighborhood. The man she was here to visit lived on the top floor, three windows down from the alley. The building had a state-of-the-art security system and a doorman, but Rena Rouge wasn't concerned. Standing in the alley between that apartment building and the one next to it, she leapt ten meters into the air towards one building. As her feet touched the wall, she sprang off into a back flip, timing the turn to bring her feet into contact with a point further up the other building's wall. She progressed in this way, leaping between walls, until she reached the roof of the target building. Then it was simply a matter of counting windows and dropping down to the correct window sill.

Fortunately, her target had left his window unlocked, and she was able to push it open and slip inside without trouble. A quick sweep of the darkened apartment showed that her target was not home. While she waited for him to arrive, Rena Rouge searched every possible hiding place, looking for evidence.

"There's got to be something here I can use," she muttered, running her hand between the couch cushions. "I know he had motive. I know he had the opportunity. But how…" Her eyes lit up when her fingers closed around a flash drive. "Yes!" she whispered triumphantly. "The over-confident ones are always the sloppiest."

At that moment she heard a key inserted into the outside door's lock. Looking around the ransacked room, she realized there was no way to hide her search. She shrugged. _Nothing for it but "shock and awe."_ Rena Rouge grabbed the cord to turn off the overhead light and dropped into an armchair next to a floor lamp. She sat still as the door swung open and her target stepped inside, reaching to turn on the overhead light as he did so. Nothing happened, and Rena Rouge got a quick glimpse of the confusion in his face in the reflected light from the hallway before she finally turned on the lamp beside her.

"Monsieur Renald Janet," she intoned, enunciating each syllable slowly. She folded her hands in front of herself, placed her elbows on the armrests, and leaned forward to rest her chin on her hands. "I've been waiting for you."

Janet, his hand still on the handle and the door still open, turned to run away. Rena Rouge, however, threw her flute with unerring accuracy. The flute deflected off the wall and struck the door, knocking it shut before he could do more than turn. The flute ricocheted back to her hand. "You don't want to be running away just yet," she told him, smirking. "You just got home! Sit down! Relax! You're just having a conversation with a friend."

"Are you my friend?" Janet demanded, puffing up his chest. "Because I don't consider breaking and entering to be 'friendly' behavior!"

"You had better hope I'm your friend," Rena Rouge informed him, eyes hardening. "You see, the last person I met who didn't want to be my friend? He did eventually tell me everything I wanted to know. But he needed a fresh change of underwear when I got done with him. Do you want that to happen to _you_, Monsieur Renald Janet?"

"I assure you, I have no idea who you are or what you are doing in my apartment," he retorted. "And even if I _did_ know, I wouldn't tell you anything!"

"Clearly you don't pay close enough attention to the news if you don't recognize me – your former employer even sells my shirts!" Rena Rouge snorted. "But you really don't have to tell me all that much," she informed him. "I already found this flash drive." She watched his face carefully as she held it up for him to see.

He paled. "I-I'm sure I don't know what that is!"

She shook her head and said, "I'm so disappointed in you… Monsieur Renald Janet. I expected a _little_ more of a challenge from you. But… I guess I shouldn't have expected so much from a simple, boring middle manager."

"What?" he whispered, brow furrowed in confusion.

"That's all you really are," she told him, laughing derisively. "You're a middle manager. You make other people look good, but you never get to take any of the credit, do you? I follow the papers: you worked for Agreste Fashion for how many months, and you were never mentioned once? _Hawk Moth's son_ went from social outcast almost all the way back to Paris' golden boy while you were there, but you never got any credit for it. Agreste's reputation turned around under your management, and all the credit went to other people."

"It was all that stupid kid and his _stupid_ girlfriend!" Janet grumbled.

"Yeah. Them," Rena Rouge replied, catching herself an instant before she would have bared her teeth at him. With an effort she maintained her seat and kept talking – instead of grabbing him by the throat and dangling him out the window. "I bet that ate you up inside."

"Not as much as when they fired me!" Janet retorted heatedly. "All my hard work and they threw me away like garbage!"

"You must have been angry."

"Of course I was!"

"You must have wanted to do anything to get back at them."

"Absolutely."

"So when they contacted you, you leapt at the chance."

"What?" Janet gave her a look of confusion.

"We both know you're not the brains behind this little frame job," Rena Rouge told him. "You couldn't plan something as elaborate as this to save your life. All the computer stuff was so many works of art – and you wouldn't know a computer virus if it gave you a fever. Someone hired you. Now give me a name."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"I'm sure you don't," Rena Rouge said drily. "If you had any brains at all, you would have steered clear of this. But I'm sure there's _something_ you remember. Or at least for your sake I _hope_ there is. Because otherwise I _will_ give you something to remember…" She started twirling the flute around her fingers contemplatively.

Janet wilted. "I met some guy two nights ago and he gave me the flash drive and an envelope of materials, along with a sheet of instructions. I did what I was told and burned the instructions as soon as I was done. The only thing I have left that he gave me is this." He withdrew a lynchpin from his pocket.

"A lynchpin," Rena Rouge deadpanned. "Terrific."

* * *

"A, it's me. I've got a problem, and it's right up your alley." Rena Rouge stood on the roof of Janet's apartment building, flute held up to her ear. She had tied Janet up with an extension cord, thrown him in his bedroom, and sealed the door shut from the outside to keep him from escaping before she could track down his lead. _No sense calling this in to the police and alerting the mole._

"What's the problem?" Anansi asked.

"Your Lynchpin tried to hurt my friends," Rena Rouge growled. "It seems that he did find that 'Spider' character, and now I know what he needed him for. He tried to ruin my best friends' lives, he attacked their relationship, and he almost got one of them arrested!"

"Who, Cat and Bug?"

"Sunshine and Rainbows, actually."

Anansi chuckled. "I take it now that you're going on the warpath you need Anansi to crack some skulls?"

"Pretty much. I need your… unique… method of investigation to find Spider," she agreed.

"You happen to be in luck, sis. There's a bookie I know who specializes in high-tech. I've been meaning to drop in on him since our last meet-up. He might know something. Meet me at the Place de la Bastille; he hangs out at a dive bar nearby."

Rena Rouge ended the call and raced across the apartment building roof to leap to the building next door, relishing in the wind rushing through her hair. For the first time since Marinette told her about the picture, she could finally start to relax. Maybe she couldn't wave her hand and make all of their problems go away, but she could at least cut through enough of this web to give her friends some breathing room. She allowed herself a little smile. _Just debunking that _picture_ would have been enough to do that!_ Unfortunately, everything she had found tonight left her feeling as though the other shoe was just about to drop. Maybe it was just a coincidence that Lynchpin had set his sights on Agreste this time around; but what if it wasn't?

Rena Rouge arrived at the Place de la Bastille three minutes later to find Anansi leaning against the pillar and waiting for her.

"You're late," Anansi observed, quirking an eyebrow at her. "Seriously, you must have broken some kind of record. This means that much to you?"

"When you go after my _family_, you wake the fox," Rena Rouge fumed. "When I find this Lynchpin guy, I'm going to take my flute and shove it so far up his–"

"Easy there, baby sis," Anansi soothed her, putting an arm around her shoulders. "The bar is two blocks over. Shall we?"

"Lead the way." The two jogged in silence, Rena Rouge slowing her miraculous-enhanced pace so Anansi could keep up. The neighborhood quickly changed as they left the main streets behind. Anansi looked around furtively before leading Rena Rouge into a narrow alley between two buildings, down a set of steps, and up to a solid metal door.

"You should probably de-transform," Anansi told her. "You'll stick out in here."

"You do remember who I am, right?" Rena Rouge asked wryly. "Do you really think bringing your seventeen-year-old sister into a place like this is a better idea than bringing a superhero?"

Anansi snorted. "Good point. All the same, follow my lead. And don't touch _anything_ they serve; Mom and Dad would _kill_ me!" She rapped three times on the door in quick succession. The door creaked open, and they entered.

At a nod from Anansi, Rena Rouge split away to cover the left side of the room, while Anansi walked along the right side. She was surprised when very few of the customers batted an eye at seeing one of the Heroes of Paris; they all appeared far too engrossed in the drinks in front of them to notice her. In her peripheral vision, Rena Rouge watched Anansi approach a man in a loud purple suit and start a hurried conversation with him. No one else seemed to be paying any attention to her, and Rena Rouge returned to surveying the faces around her until… _there_: a man with a spider web tattoo covering his entire face. His hands shook so badly that his drink sloshed down his front, and when he moved to wipe it away, Rena Rouge caught sight of needle marks on his arm.

Rena Rouge flicked her ponytail once. A small nod from Anansi was all the warning she received before Anansi grabbed a beer mug from the bar and threw it across the room. The mug shattered as Anansi picked up a stool and swung it at a customer's back. She pushed the stool into another customer's hands before the first man turned around. That man punched the one holding the stool, and all of their friends joined the rapidly-expanding brawl. Anansi ducked away from the scrum and pushed a table over, spilling drinks and plates all over the floor.

In the pandemonium, Rena Rouge slipped past a pair of drunks wrestling on a table and grabbed Spider's arm, pulling him close to herself and wrapping an arm tightly around his shoulder. She jammed her flute into his side as he was about to shout, and he immediately stiffened. "Come quietly, or we see how long you last against the _other_ 'spider'!" she hissed, directing him toward the door.

As they exited, Anansi joined them, pulling the door shut after them. "Remind me not to invite you out with us for my 18th birthday," Rena Rouge commented as the tumult in the bar was muffled.

"Oh, please, what's the point of going to a ratty old dive bar if you don't get to experience a true bar brawl?" Anansi retorted.

The two heroes led their prisoner further into the alley before Rena Rouge pushed him against the wall. Rena Rouge pushed her flute up against his throat, forcing him to stay upright.

"What do you chicks want with me?" he whined, holding his hands up in front of his face.

"You're Spider?" Rena Rouge demanded.

"Who wants to know?"

She looked over at Anansi and shook her head in disbelief. "It's like they doesn't read the papers or something. I thought the outfit would be a giveaway…"

Spider looked closer. "You're one of them Heroes, then? In that case I'm _definitely_ not Spider."

"Do you believe him, Anansi?" Rena Rouge asked, smirking.

"You know, I think I do!" replied Anansi. "But then I look at his ugly face and I'm not sure…"

"Gotten your webs into any exciting new computer viruses lately, Spider?" Rena Rouge asked, turning back to him.

"Just some stupid corporate job." He shrugged. "Messing with financials, that sort of thing… nothing too exciting."

"You know who hired you?" Anansi asked next. "Got any shiny new lynchpins on you?"

He reached into his pocket. "What, you mean like this? Why, you need one?"

"Why can't they all be this easy?" Rena Rouge wondered. At that moment a pair of SUVs pulled up at opposite ends of the alley and four men got out of each and raced down the alley toward them. Behind the thugs a man in a white suit exited one of the SUVs and slowly walked toward them.

"You had to say 'easy,'" Anansi groaned.

The two heroes turned to face opposite directions and charged as one. Rena Rouge ducked under the first man's punch and swept his legs out from under him before springing up and slamming her flute into another man's face. She side-stepped a kick and elbowed the third man hard in the gut before kicking the last man in the chest so hard he flew across the alley into the wall, sliding down it in a crumpled heap. From the sounds behind her, Anansi had likewise dispatched her opponents.

The man in the white suit at the end of the alley stared at Rena Rouge in wide-eyed shock, taking in the quick demise of his muscle. Then he turned to run back to his SUV. "Oh, no you don't!" Rena Rouge muttered, raising the flute to her lips. She played a note and swung her flute, sending the Mirage after him. In the same motion she flung the flute over the Mirage bubble. The flute struck the man in the back of his head two meters from the SUV, knocking him to the ground an instant before the Mirage expanded to cover his entire body, hiding him from view. The SUV's tires screeched and it peeled off as Rena Rouge raced to the spot, followed closely by Anansi.

Rena Rouge dispersed the Mirage with a wave of her hand, revealing the man in the white suit, blinking and struggling to push himself up into a sitting position. She reached out to grab the flute that had landed next to him. Then she took a closer look at him. "No way," she breathed.

"You recognize him?" Anansi asked.

"From the fashion show," she nodded.

"Right… Crazy and the Professor said something about that."

"Holy hell…" she whispered. The missing puzzle pieces all clicked into place. She glared at Anansi. "And you didn't think to share?"

"Never came up." Anansi shrugged. "You know now."

They turned back to the man lying on the ground in front of them. He held his hands up in front of his face and said, "If you promise to let me go, I'll answer all your questions."

Anansi growled, "Talk first. Deal later," a moment before a _crack_ split the night.

* * *

_One chapter left to this story..._


	10. Chapter 10

_To anonymousfriend27: Alya did develop something of a mean streak in her interrogations, didn't she? The "missing pieces" get put together in this chapter, and will lead directly into the next batch of stories… none of which are written yet. They are planned, but this is a busy season for my profession, so I'm not going to be doing much writing for the next month or so. I will give a little more of a "what's coming" in a day or two._

_To Speckleflower: "Legality" and "superhero-detective" don't always seem to go together… The only thing of questionable legality that she did (in that chapter; her interrogation in chapter 1 could have been borderline-torture!) was the search of his apartment. If they didn't have Spider as a corroborating witness, Janet's lawyer could probably get the flash drive thrown out, though warrant laws don't exactly apply to private citizens. But the Heroes aren't _strictly_ private citizens, so… Janet's trial could be an interesting case study in superhero law in this universe!_

_To Dragon Lord Draco: … Anansi didn't actually do anything to him… I don't think anyone actually noticed the last cliffhanger in this story!  
_

* * *

Rena Rouge stared in stunned disbelief at the spot where a man's head had been a moment before. Anansi, kneeling on the opposite side of the body, wore an identical expression. But only for an instant. Before the echo of the gunshot had faded, both heroes sprang into action. Rena Rouge extended her flute to full length, turned to face the direction the bullet had probably come from, and started spinning her flute to form a shield. She stood up and moved to interpose her flute-shield between the shooter and Anansi, who was scanning the rooftops surrounding them.

"Sniper!" she shouted unnecessarily, peering through her spinning flute and looking for movement.

"We need to get to cover!" Anansi called, putting a hand on Rena Rouge's shoulder. "Pity you didn't bring your boyfriend this time!"

"Someone had to watch the twins, and I figured you were already busy!" Rena Rouge retorted as she slowly shuffled out of the alley and away from the alley's entrance.

"So what now?" Anansi demanded, slumping against the wall.

Rena Rouge gauged the distance to the roof and crouched down, coiled and ready to spring. "Stay here and keep an eye out. I'll try to flush them in this direction." And then she leapt.

Rena Rouge reached out and grabbed a small protrusion from the wall and used it to propel herself up to the window ledge on the next floor. Without slowing down she pulled herself up by the arms, braced her feet on the ledge, and pushed off, quickly scaling the building. As she neared the top she jammed her flute into a small hole in the façade, swung around it, and threw herself upward, slipping the flute out of the hole in the same motion and torquing her body to swing over the roof edge. She landed softly and rolled to crouch on one knee behind a chimney. After waiting a moment, she peeked out around the chimney.

On the far end of the roof she could just make out a darker patch standing out against the night, kneeling near the edge of the roof. It did not appear to be facing her, so Rena Rouge slipped out from behind the chimney on the opposite side, away from the alley. She carefully picked her way across the rooftop, sweeping with her feet to avoid loose gravel and discarded building materials, eyes trained on her target. She was still 20 meters away when she stepped on a bird's nest. She winced as it crunched under her feet. The shadow on the far end of the roof sprang up at the noise and immediately bolted away from her, opposite the direction in which Anansi was waiting.

Rena Rouge cursed and gave chase. The sniper didn't slow his pace on nearing the edge of the roof. He leapt from that building to the next one, hotly pursued by Rena Rouge. The next building's roof slanted, and the sniper climbed hand-over hand to the roof's peak, swung over it, and slid down to the roof edge where he jumped to the next building. Rena Rouge lost sight of him with the roof peak between them, but followed him over the roof. However, the sniper had vanished in the space between the buildings. She searched the area where he should have been carefully, but could find no trace of him.

Rena Rouge groaned in frustration as she made her way back to the building where she had first seen the sniper. Finding the spot where the sniper had set up and made the shot proved to be relatively simple; the sniper had left behind his brass. Rena Rouge picked up the casing for Max to examine later. On the edge of the roof she saw the expected lynchpin, which she also collected.

"Any luck?" Anansi asked when Rena Rouge dropped to the ground next to her.

"What does it look like?" Rena Rouge retorted, kicking the wall in frustration before tossing her the lynchpin.

"This one looks different from the others," Anansi observed, holding it under the streetlight for her to see. There was a thin red band around one end of the pin. "What do you think it means?"

"Have you seen one like this before?"

Anansi shook her head.

"So either there's a new player, or this hitter is special," Rena Rouge commented. "Or maybe the hit itself was special. Either way, Lynchpin must have been concerned. This guy was the closest we've come to a corner piece in this puzzle, and he must've known he'd break if he was caught. He must have had the sniper watching just in case. And that's why White Suit was the target instead of us"

"And now we're back to square one," Anansi grumbled.

"At least we can get Adrien out of his legal trouble," Rena Rouge said, shrugging. "Maybe something new will turn up. Can you take Spider to the police station in the 21st Arrondissement? I'll meet you there after I collect my other prisoner."

"Not a problem, sis," Anansi assured her, making her way back down the alley to where Spider had passed out against the wall.

"Don't hand him over to anyone but Lieutenant Roger Raincomprix!" Rena Rouge called after her. Without waiting for an answer she took off at a dead sprint back to Janet's apartment building. On the way she used her flute to make a phone call.

"Hey, Sabrina," she greeted her as soon as the call connected.

"You sound out of breath," Sabrina observed, yawning audibly.

"Oh, you know, just out for a run!" Rena Rouge grunted as she leapt from one building to another across a street and rolled back to her feet without breaking stride.

"I'm sure," Sabrina retorted wryly. "That's definitely why you're calling me at 2:30 in the morning. And I'm sure this has nothing to do with why you needed me for some last-minute babysitting help so you and Marinette could run off together. What do you need?"

"So, I have good news and bad news," Rena Rouge answered. "The _good_ news is that I have all the evidence your father needs to _not_ arrest Cat Noir and start a war with the Heroes of Paris. The _bad_ news is that I have all the evidence your father needs to not arrest Cat Noir, and there's no way I'm giving it to anyone but him."

"That's amazing!" she squealed, all grogginess vanishing from her voice. "And you're actually in luck. Daddy switched shifts with the night lieutenant, so he's at the station right now."

Ten minutes later, Rena Rouge landed on the steps of the police station, Janet bound and gagged and slung over her shoulder. Anansi was just arriving herself, pushing a still-protesting Spider in front of her. They met Lieutenant Raincomprix at the station door with another officer.

"What can I do for you ladies this evening?" Lieutenant Raincomprix asked them, eyeing their prisoners suspiciously.

"We've got a couple of packages to deliver," Rena Rouge replied with a smirk, lifting Janet from her shoulder. He landed the officers' feet with a muffled grunt of protest, glaring up at Rena Rouge over the gag. Ignoring him, she pulled out the flash drive. "We were out investigating a case for the Heroes when we stumbled across this idiot sneaking away from the Agreste Fashion House building the other night. When I finally tracked down his apartment tonight, I found this. From what he said, he used it to hack Agreste's files and move some money around. Then one thing led to another and…" she gestured over to Spider, who was giving the officers a wide-eyed look of undisguised terror.

Lieutenant Raincomprix nodded. "My thanks to you, Rena Rouge," he told her, giving her a relieved smile. "And to your… friend. This could help us clear up a very big case we've been working on the last couple days – one that threatened to become very _public_ and very embarrassing. I'm sure my daughter and her friends will be relieved if this does indeed clear everything up. But from what you say, it certainly sounds to me like our primary suspect was framed."

Rena Rouge gave him a serious look. "You need to keep this as close to the vest as you can, Lieutenant," she insisted. "From what the prisoners said, this is just the tip of a very big iceberg. And if you send some men to check out an alley three blocks west of the Place de la Bastille, you will see exactly _why_. These people have someone in the police department, and _you_ are the only one we trust!"

"Thank you for the warning, ma'am," he assured her. "I had some indicators of just that some time ago. And I thank you for your trust. I promise you, I will be cautious."

"See that you are." Rena Rouge nodded to Anansi, who roughly shoved Spider into the other officer's arms and turned to follow her down the steps. They slipped into an alley down the block where Rena Rouge leaned against the wall, closed her eyes for a moment, and de-transformed, releasing a night's worth of tension at the same time.

"That is never going to stop being weird," Anansi observed.

"You'll get used to it," Alya promised her. She opened her eyes and pulled a few crackers out of her purse for Trixx. "You're going to be seeing it a whole lot more now."

Anansi furrowed her brow. "What are you talking about?"

"This has gone too far," Alya told her, giving her a hard look. "I need to bring you in. Now. I probably should have done it a month ago. We can't keep my team in the dark anymore. Ladybug and Cat Noir _have to hear_ about Lynchpin after all this."

"No way, sis." Anansi shook her head. "I don't mind helping you out; I don't mind _you_ helping _me_ out. But we've been over this already. There's no way I'm signing on with your group. Give me one good reason why I should loop Spotty and Puss-in-Boots in on this."

Alya sighed and shook her head. "How about three? First, the fashion show that these guys tried to rob. Second, the sweatshop making knock-offs of an Agreste dress that you broke up. Third, the frame job that nearly got Adrien arrested for embezzlement _at the same time_ that they tried to split him up from his girlfriend. Are you seeing the pattern here? I might buy one of those being a coincidence, maybe even two, but all three, and with how elaborate this last one was? This is targeted. We may not be any closer to figuring out who Lynchpin _is_, but now I think we have an idea what he's _after_, or at least one thing. And it's Agreste Fashion in general, and Adrien Agreste specifically. Now we just don't know why."

"Fine." Anansi shrugged. "Say I buy your reasoning. What's that got to do with your Super-Pals of Paris?"

"Trust me, when we get to headquarters, it will all make sense."

* * *

_The fashion show was in "Tit for Tat." The knock-off dress was mentioned in "Along Came Anansi." Also in "Along Came Anansi," Alya essentially revealed her identity to Sabrina because the Heroes have been using her father as their unofficial police contact. And all of the Heroes (minus the Owl, probably) know Adrien's and Marinette's identities since their Headquarters is in Adrien's basement._

_This is the end of "The Fashion Disaster." However, I will add a note here tomorrow regarding my future plans._


	11. A Note for the Future

_To anonymousfriend27: I actually considered Raincomprix being the police mole (if Adrien's father can be a super-villain, why can't another character's father be a bad guy, too?). I haven't decided who the police mole will be yet, so it _could_ be him…_

* * *

After publishing a chapter daily for a month and a half, it's weird to think I don't actually have something for today (other than this). However, thanks to beginning one of the two busy seasons in my regular job, I haven't actually been able to write much of anything for fan fiction in March (I finished "The Fashion Disaster" at the end of February, just in time). I started writing the next one-shot for "An Adrienette Anthology" last week, but even _that_ isn't finished yet.

All of that is a quick explanation of why the "Mind Games"-verse is going on a hiatus for the next month or more. I will still publish "Anthology" one-shots as I finish them – I hope to finish the next one this week. I may even write one-shots outside the "Anthology" if the inspiration strikes. But I probably won't be able to finish anything longer before Easter. I am planning to pick up the story, about a month or so after "The Fashion Disaster," so this is simple a "To Be Continued…"

That's not to say I'm going to disappear for the next couple months. In fact, my schedule has cleared up a bit with the COVID-19 shutdowns, so I will have a little more time for writing, but not enough to promise a new story before Easter.

In the meantime, I'm planning to cross-post all of the "Mind Games"-verse stories onto Archive of Our Own ("tptplayer5701") since I've come to appreciate the formatting there, including the ability to navigate multi-story arcs. I am going to revise as I go, so there will be small differences (mostly replacing "Mr." with "M."), but otherwise the AO3 version will be mostly identical to the FF version. The lone exception is "Tit for Tat," for which I'm considering adding a chapter at the beginning (which would change chapter 4 slightly). If I do, I may publish the new chapter at the end of "Tit for Tat" on FF, since otherwise I think I would need to completely republish the story.

When thinking about this break, I started considering the "Mind Games"-verse in terms of "seasons." The first couple stories (through "Mind Games") are a single narrative that ends the Hawk Moth story arc from the series and establishes Marinette and Adrien without secret identities – "Season 0" (or an alternate ending to the show's Season 3 – eliminating "Kwamibuster," "Feast," "Ikari Gozen," "Timetagger," "Cat Blanc," and "The Battle of the Miraculous"). If you are curious about why I'm ignoring any of those episodes, let me know.

Everything since then (from "Bugs Have to Stick Together" up to "The Fashion Disaster") focuses on three things. Marinette and Adrien respond to the possible future they saw in "Running out of Time." The team expands with the addition of new heroes and new types of heroes (non-Miraculous). The next threat to Paris emerges. "Season 1," if you will.

So the next group of stories would be "Season 2." What will that entail? Check back in a month or two to find out!

In the meantime, here is your tease for the next four multi-chapter stories I'm planning and working on. Titles are not set for any of these.

"A Peruvian Adventure" – When Adrien is attacked on a business trip to South America, the encounter draws him and Marinette into an intercontinental adventure of Miraculous proportions. Who attacked him and why? Who are the mysterious agents tracking them? Can they find the prize before it falls into the wrong hands?

"Long Live the Queen" – Queen Bee has disappeared! When Chloe fails to meet up with Sabrina, it is up to Alya, with Nino and Anansi in tow, to track her down. What happened to their only "public" Hero? Could this be the work of Lynchpin's agents?

"Purity and Corruption" – While on assignment for the Heroes of Paris, Viperion and Ryoku encounter a new player in the Miraculous world of Paris – one that rings a bell for Ryoku. But is everything as it seems?

"No More Monkey Games" – Alix is skating in the zoo when all the animals suddenly go wild. Then King Monkey shows up and the Monkey games commence! What's a girl to do when a Monkey starts fighting a bear right in front of her? Join in the fun, of course!


End file.
